I picked up the English books Shafirgullah had been reading, ripped out more pages, and burned them as well. But, as before, the dampness prevented them from fully catching on fire. I stared at the glowing embers and wondered how I would spend the time. And how much time I’d have to spend before someone came back. I had only enough cookies and juice to last a couple days.
I flipped open my notebook and reread some of the letters and notes I’d written that first week in captivity.
October 13, 4:30 p.m., eating two chocolate cookies. I suppose this will be dinner.
October 20, 6:15 a.m., Grandma’s birthday. Lots of noise outside last night—possibly a firefight.
October 26, 9:30 p.m., Khalid called Shafirgullah to confirm he wasn’t coming tonight.
I reread all the letters I’d written—to Paul, to my friends, to my parents. I could see the times I had been hopeful, and the times I had not.
Suddenly, I heard footsteps. Clomp, clomp, clomp, clomp. Someone was walking overtop of the hole. I stood up and looked up the pipe, which I knew was futile, but at least I’d be able to call out if I decided I needed to.
“Mellissa!” I heard. I thought it sounded like Abdulrahman. I was about to answer but then remembered I wasn’t supposed to respond to my own name.
“Khalid!” I heard a few seconds later. “Khalid!”
“Yes? Abdulrahman?”
“Yes, Mellissa, hello. Can you hear?”
“I can hear you. Can you hear me?”
“Yes, I hear. Okay. Tell me what is your sister’s favourite hockey player?”
My sister’s favourite hockey player? Another proof-of-life question. They had to be getting them through Vanessa. The answer was easy.
“Trevor Linden!” I yelled.
“What?”
I yelled it again but it was still lost on the fat Afghan.
“TREVOR—T-R-E-V…”
“T-R-E-B…” he repeated.
“NO! Not B! V!”
I made him repeat the spelling to me until I was satisfied with it. And I made him put down the number 16, which was Linden’s number, so there could be no mistaking. But I didn’t want him to go just yet. I told him I needed more batteries for the tsiragh, and that I was running out of juice boxes. Oh, and I also wanted more cigarettes.
“Okay, okay,” he called down. “I bring for you.”
“Abdulrahman!” I had one more question. “When do I go back to Kabul?”
“In two days, inshallah. Saba, saba.”
“Are you sure?” I asked, knowing that he wasn’t, but I wanted to see how he’d respond.
“Inshallah! I go now. Goodbye!” And he was gone.
That was the third proof of life, a sign that my captors were still talking to whoever was negotiating for me, and it made me feel a little better that the process was still in play.
Trevor Linden. The one-time captain of the Vancouver Canucks, he was the most popular player ever to wear the team uniform. With his dark curly hair and nice-guy demeanour, he had been the heartthrob for a generation of female Canucks fans, my sister included. She had all the incarnations of the team jersey with the number 16 emblazoned on the back, which she’d wear proudly whenever she was at a Canucks game in Los Angeles or Anaheim.
Hey V
I hope you’re doing okay over there. They asked me who your favourite hockey player was today, and I almost laughed. I had to explain to them what hockey is, and here is one of my kidnappers asking who your favourite player is. I thought that was pretty funny.
I know you’re probably dealing with a heck of a lot—with Mom and Dad and the CBC and everyone else. I hope you’re managing and hanging in there. I feel terrible that I put you down as an emergency contact because I can’t imagine the phone call you would have got in the middle of the night from someone telling you I’ve been kidnapped. I’m so sorry, but I never thought this could happen. You shouldn’t have to be dealing with all this when you’ve already got enough on your plate.
But I wouldn’t trust anyone else to take care of stuff for me, and I hope I’ll be out soon enough and can make it up to you. I’ll take you to a Canucks game maybe! Although you get to enough of them down there as it is.
If you’re reading this, and something’s happened to me, just know that I’ve made you the beneficiary in everything. It’s the least I could do, right? There should be enough to pay for everything that needs to be paid for—like my massive Visa bill—and some left over for you to do what you want with.
I love you so much. Hope you’re taking care of yourself. I’m glad I got to see you before I came here—I just wish we’d had more time.
See you soon, hopefully.
M
I was glad that I’d been able to see my sister before I left for Afghanistan. She had been in Toronto for the international film festival, and we’d spent the night with Jen and Paul at the bar of the Drake Hotel, on Queen Street. I hoped they were all leaning on each other now and helping each other get through whatever hell I knew they were enduring. A fresh wave of guilt came over me. The pain and anguish and worry I was causing everyone at home was something I didn’t want to think about. It scared me and had the potential to paralyze me, so I’d been trying hard not to dwell on what my parents must be suffering, or what my sister might be thinking, or how my friends might be coping.
I looked down at my hands and noticed they were a dark shade of brown, and there was a thick layer of dirt under my fingernails. I looked through my makeup bag and found my nail clipper. I used the tip of the small nail file to dig out the dirt from underneath each of my nails. Soon, I had a small pile of dirt in front of me. I rubbed my hands together hard, and noticed that thin ribbons of brown grime were forming as I rubbed. I rubbed the back of my left hand with my right middle finger and a ball of brown goop formed underneath my finger. And it was the same everywhere. My forearms, my neck, behind my ears, my chest. I was covered in it, and was suddenly obsessed with rubbing it all off. I hoped I wasn’t losing my mind, but I kept rubbing and rubbing, until I had a pile of brown dirt balls in front of me. I threw them all toward the door, and they scattered among the cigarette butts and rocks on the ground.
Shafirgullah had not left me any water, so I couldn’t even rinse my hands after that nasty exercise. I thought I had some hand sanitizer with me, forgetting until I started digging in my knapsack that I’d already been through that routine. It wasn’t there. Abdulrahman must have taken it when he brought my bag down from the mountain on that first night. Maybe I really was starting to lose my mind. Too many hours spent talking to myself, going back and forth and forth and back over possible scenarios and why they might or might not happen. Too much time spent repeating the same phrases over and over again, talking to kidnappers who didn’t understand what I was saying. Too much time spent by myself wondering and waiting and twiddling my thumbs. No wonder I was starting to lose it. Any sane person would, wouldn’t she?
I looked down at the rosary I’d vowed not to pray with again and picked it up. I didn’t have much of a choice, did I?
Oh my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended Thee, and I detest my sins, because I dread the loss of heaven and the pains of hell…
Funny that the Act of Contrition would be the first prayer to pop into my head at that moment. I had planned on starting with the Hail Marys, but for some reason, the Act of Contrition just came to me.
But most of all because they offend Thee, my God, Who art good and deserving of all my love. I firmly resolve, with the help of Thy grace, to confess my sins, to do penance, and amend my life. Amen.
I’d last been to confession in Italy, when the girls and I had taken a day trip to Rome before Maureen’s wedding. We were in Vatican City, and they were heading to the Vatican Museums, but I wanted to go to confession instead. The only time I ever went to confession anymore was at St. Peter’s Basilica. A special occasion. The priest in the confessional told me to say the Act of Contrition, and for a second, I couldn�
��t remember it.
“Look down,” he told me, and that’s when I noticed it was written right there, where my elbows were. It was obvious that I didn’t go to confession very often.
My mother used to remind us around Lent before Easter, and Advent before Christmas, that we should make a confession before the major feast days. My sister and I are both somewhat lapsed Catholics, and neither of us had been to confession regularly since high school, when priests would come to our school for penitential services.
Maybe, I thought to myself now, the Act of Contrition came to me because I was about to be released soon. A big feast day was just around the corner.
Okay, God, maybe you are listening to me. Maybe you’re hearing me after all. I’ll come off my prayer strike, and you can prove to me that you’ve been listening all along. I’m beginning to think, after all, that you are the only one who can help me out of here. So please make it happen soon. Please hear my prayers.
And then I started again, praying the rosary, and the one prayer that I must have said thousands of times over the last four weeks.
Hail Mary, full of grace,
The Lord is with thee.
I was sitting with my girlfriends by the infinity pool at our rented villa in Umbria, and we were drinking beer. The girls looked worried. I can’t remember what we were talking about, but my friend Angela put her hand down firmly on the arm of her deck chair and declared, “This weekend! It’s going to happen this weekend! It will be over this weekend!”
I sat up, confused as to where I was. Where did everyone go? Where was the pool? A beam of light illuminated a small patch of wall across from me. And then my heart sank as I realized I had been dreaming. I wasn’t with my girlfriends in Italy. I was still in a dark, disgusting hole somewhere in northern Afghanistan.
What a strange dream. It had felt so real. I could see all my friends as they were the summer before, sitting by the pool and talking to each other, faces illuminated and skin darkened, kissed by the Umbrian sun. What was Ange talking about? I looked at the clock—it was almost six o’clock. Damn if I couldn’t get a break and sleep for a few more hours. Six in the morning, Saturday, was about nine o’clock Friday night in Toronto, and I imagined that my girlfriends were gathering somewhere over drinks, talking about their week—and probably worrying about me. At least they were together, and I knew they would be drinking copious amounts of wine. Another day, another week had passed with no news of me. Or maybe there was news. I thought about my parents, and my sister, and how helpless and far away they must be feeling, hope ebbing and flowing with the dawn and dusk of each day.
Not unlike what I was experiencing in my hole. My emotions rode the same wave almost every day. I’d wake up and wonder if this would be the day. Anticipation would start growing by the hour, peaking around six in the evening, when it was dark, because I knew if I were going to be dug out, they would come at night. Then between six and eight, I would be on high alert for any sound, any hint, that my kidnappers were coming to take me back to Kabul. Nothing would happen, and by nine o’clock I would be despondent, resigned to another night in the hole, disappointed that yet again I was still here, and freedom was only a dream. And this pattern would start all over again as soon as I woke up.
This dawn was no different. It was Saturday, November 8. Three nights had passed since my kidnappers returned me to the hole after our mountain hike. Exactly four weeks before, I was in my work tent in Kandahar, packing a small bag to take for my flight to Kabul. Paul had walked with me to the tent—we’d gone to the gym on the base that morning, and I had to pack the camera and my computer, and my radio equipment. The public affairs officer was going to take me to the civilian airport for my Kam Air flight to the capital. I should have been home by now, my five-week assignment in Afghanistan over, and organizing my move to Toronto from Regina.
I sighed and was just about to turn to a fresh page in my notebook when I heard footsteps. It was early for someone to come by, but Abdulrahman had come this early before, when he was asking the proof-of-life questions.
“Mellissa.” He called my name a couple more times, and it occurred to me that he might have forgotten what I was told about not answering to my name.
“Khalid!” he called down, finally realizing his mistake.
“Yes, Abdulrahman?” I stood up and shuffled my chained feet over to the pipe hole.
“Saba—tomorrow—we go Kabul. You and me go.”
“What?” I asked. “Tomorrow? Are you sure? Where’s Khalid?”
“Khalid go too. You, me, Khalid.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes,” he said. I could hear him stuffing something into the pipe. Two batteries for the lamp, four boxes of juice, and two packages of cookies fell into my hands. If I was leaving tomorrow, why was he giving me more supplies?
“Okay?” he asked.
“Cigarettes!” I called up. I had only two more left in the package Khalid had left me.
“No cigarette,” he said.
“Come on, Abdulrahman. Please! Cigarettes!”
A few seconds later a package came down the pipe. It was stuck somewhere in the middle, and I had to shuffle back to get my pen to dislodge it. The package landed on the floor and when I picked it up, I saw that it had been opened and was missing a few smokes. Still, better than nothing, I thought.
“Thank you,” I said.
“Saba, Kabul,” he repeated.
“Okay. In the morning or in the evening?” I asked, knowing the answer but hoping he would say morning. He didn’t respond right away, and I repeated the question.
“Afternoon,” he called down. Afternoon? I assumed he meant late afternoon—early evening, after the sun had set.
“I go now. Goodbye!” He was gone as quickly as he had arrived, leaving me with more questions than answers. I desperately wanted to believe that Abdulrahman was right, but I had been disappointed too many times. Still, I thought he sounded like he knew what he was talking about. Maybe there was something happening I didn’t know about. Something that meant my release was imminent. Maybe Ange in my dream was right, that it all would be over this weekend. Tomorrow night meant only thirty-six more hours in the hole. I can handle that, I thought. It’s not too much longer.
I pulled out the second-to-last cigarette from the old box and lit it. But after only two drags, I didn’t feel like smoking any more. I was tired of the taste, and I could feel my lungs weighed down by the nicotine in my system. I didn’t want to smoke any longer, even if it did help me pass a few minutes of every hour. I put the cigarette out against the wall behind my pillow and watched the ashes crumble to rest on top of my backpack. I brushed them off.
With my legs chained together, I couldn’t even do my standing stretches, so I lay down and did a few leg lifts, lifting the heavy chain as well. I was tired after just ten, so I lay down and started to do sit-ups. This I could do. And I counted. Up to ten, down to zero, back up to ten, until I did three hundred and could do no more. Not too shabby, considering that I was probably in the worst physical shape of my life.
I flipped to a new page in my notebook and jotted down a few notes from the morning.
November 8, 6:30 a.m., Abdulrahman stops by—drops off cookies and juice—says we are going to Kabul tomorrow evening.
I reread what I had just written. Tomorrow might finally be freedom day. I had to remind myself that this could once again end in bitter disappointment, but something in Abdulrahman’s voice suggested that he wasn’t making it up this time. Or at least that’s what I wanted to believe.
I counted down the hours as I’d pretty much been doing for the last four weeks: I prayed the rosary at the top of the hour and then wrote for the rest of the hour. Noon came and went, and I ate two cookies with a sip of juice. Then it was two o’clock, then four o’clock—night would soon fall. My last night in this hole, I thought, even though I tried not to let myself believe it. I’d said that enough times now to know that there was always, alway
s, another night. I was getting used to tomorrow coming, and passing, and looking forward to another tomorrow, hoping it would finally be the day. I wasn’t going to let myself be disappointed again. Instead, I distracted myself with my pen and pad.
Dear P,
Abdulrahman said I’m going to Kabul tomorrow afternoon. I know he’s said it before, but he seems to know what he’s saying this time.
The thought crossed my mind that my idea of going to Kabul might not be the same as his. I’d been saying it as a euphemism for being freed, but it now occurred to me that my kidnappers might be taking me to Kabul to be handed over to someone else. I refused to let myself go down that path. It was too scary.
You’ll be happy to know that I’ve stopped smoking for the time being. I took a puff this morning, and I couldn’t smoke anymore. Maybe my lungs are trying to tell me something—that I need to stop if I ever want to start running again.
I’m not sure where you are. Maybe you needed to leave Afghanistan after so long, and if you did, I wouldn’t blame you. It’s not a great place to be hanging out and waiting. I just hope that wherever you are, you know I’m thinking about you, and that “talking” to you all the time has saved my sanity while I’ve been here. I’ll be okay, and so will we. I promise I’ll make this up to you when I get home. I can’t imagine what you’ve been through the last four weeks. I am so, so sorry.
xox
Sure, I wanted to get the hell out of the place desperately, but more than that, I wanted to stop the pain I was surely inflicting on those closest to me.
Don’t worry, I said to myself. It’s your last night here and this time tomorrow, you’ll be on your way to Kabul, where you can tell everyone you’re okay, and you’re sorry for everything you put them through.
Under an Afghan Sky Page 30