Six Months in Sudan

by Dr. James Maskalyk

“I want you to take it down.”

  It was so important to me. It helped me through.

  I stop him.

  “Listen. I just got back. I’m sick, and I’m tired, and you’re the first person I’ve seen, so … no, wait. … I worked hard, and if I had an hour, I sat with … goddamn … tissues under my wrists and told the story because I thought that was part of it. But now I’m done. My contract is over. So if you want to talk as two colleagues, I’m happy to do that. If not, well, I think I would rather just be alone.”

  He starts again. No concerns with my medical work. TB, great. Geneva. Canada. Blogs.

  I sit back. My attention turns again to the table beside me. The woman who is going to Burma is leaning forward, scratching important details into her small notebook. She glances over at me once, and smiles.

  Her face is open and ready.

  23/07: corner.

  so. it was like marco said. the sights, the noises, the days that surrounded me so completely, they collapse. they collapse, but they don’t disappear. it is as if you have shut off an old tv and all the images and sounds are compressed into that one bright point in the middle of the screen. incandescent, it lasts and lasts, too bright to forget.

  since i last wrote you, i have left sudan and passed through geneva for my debriefing. i am now in amsterdam, about to end my relationship with some parasites. you have to understand, it is not them, it’s me. i’m better on my own.

  the debriefing in geneva was interesting. aside from the usual talk about objectives, accomplishments, and future plans, there was considerable discussion about my blog, and about blogs in general. there are some who feel that they hide the slipperiest of slopes, that they are akin to voyeurism, a commodification of the msf experience. others, like myself, are convinced that its immediacy and combinations of media allow a story to be told in a new, powerful way and that there is a benefit in their telling. the more first-time volunteers who understand what it is truly like in the field, the better. the more people who know about abyei the better. perhaps what jane jacobs said of city streets is true of dusty border towns; it is the numbers of eyes on them that makes them safe.

  i can’t speak to all the merits and demerits of blogs, but i think i know why they work well; they are personal, immediate, and available. they make a window in the world, and when they are at their best, it is almost clean. i haven’t looked back through mine yet. not quite ready. too many little mines, memories that need to lose some of their color before they are recalled.

  I AM STANDING NEXT to another luggage carousel, sleepless, blinking. I am holding a newspaper under my arm, and am fumbling to put my SIM card into my mobile. I drop it on the floor.

  Fuck.

  The belt starts to turn. I click the cover back in place and turn my phone on.

  I have pared my things down. They all fit in one bag. I left all my books behind, most of my clothes.

  I grab my backpack from the circular parade and lean it against a white cement column. I take my phone from my pocket and call Greg. He’s coming to pick me up.

  “Hello.”

  “Bro.”

  “James? Holy shit. Man. Good to hear your voice. Where are you?”

  “Um. At the airport. Just got in from Frankfurt. I thought …”

  “You’re here already? Really? I … shit … I’ll tell you what. Let me finish this beer, and I can be there in … like an hour?”

  An hour? Bro. I thought. You’re my best. Huh.

  “Um. Forget it, dude. Driving here is a hassle. I’ll figure it out. I’ll take the bus. I’ve still got some traveling left in me. It’ll be cool. You know, a gentle … unveiling or whatever. I’ll call you when I hit the market.”

  “You sure?”

  “Definitely. No sweat.”

  “All right. Call me when you get downtown.”

  “Cool. Bye.”

  I put my bag flat on the floor, sit on it.

  What is this place? Home? I don’t know. Maybe I should have kept going. Just hung out in Europe or something, did another mission.

  I stand up, grab my dusty backpack, and heft it on. I walk towards the customs office and hand the official my form: nothing to declare. He waves me through. I approach the exit, and the gray doors slide open as I draw near.

  Greg is standing in a crowd of strangers wearing a mullet wig, a tight white tank top, and powder blue pants, three inches too short.

  “Man, I can’t believe you fell for that,” he says. “I thought I blew it for sure when I said ‘after I finish my beer.’”

  I don’t know what to say, I’m so happy. I give him a hug.

  “You all right?” he asks.

  “Yeah, dude. Just got all right.”

  “Yo, let’s get out of here. People have been staring at me for like … an hour.”

  “I wonder why.”

  “Can I take that?” he says, pointing at my satchel.

  “Hell yeah.”

  We walk through the airport’s sliding doors.

  “You sure you want a ride? Will it be enough of a slow unveiling? ‘Slow unveiling.’ So, you spent six months in Sudan and it turned you into an Elizabethan poet? That’s what happened?”

  “Fuck off.”

  We find his car in a row of others.

  “Okay. I’m not going to ask you how it was. What I will ask you is this: wanna go to a pool party? Everyone’s at the Radisson waiting for you. I’ve got an extra pair of trunks here, and a towel. Whaddaya say?”

  I want to go back to my apartment. Sit in the dark.

  “Sure.”

  “Cool.”

  We drive on the highway, watch traffic whir smoothly into traffic, then out again. Seems the same. Easy.

  “Who’s all gonna be there?” I ask.

  “Lots of people.”

  “How many?”

  “Dunno. It’s also Jay’s birthday or something.”

  That’s better. I don’t want to talk.

  “Cool.”

  We park downstairs at the Radisson and sneak in the side door, stop to buy some cigarettes. We change in the bathroom on the main floor, then walk up to the pool deck, trying to look like guests so we don’t have to pay.

  I pull open the glass door and step onto the deck. My friends.

  Jeff. He moves towards me.

  “Bro.”

  Hug.

  “James!”

  Cooper. He dives into the pool, swims towards me, clambers out, dripping.

  “Buddy.”

  Wet hug.

  More people. Fast face. Flash. Flash. Hug. Welcome back. Flash.

  “Want some of my hamburger?”

  “Here, have some of this. It’s a margarita or something.”

  “When did you get back?”

  Flash. Flash. Flash. My brain is attached to an electrical wire.

  I move away from the table. Jeff’s still looking at me. I move to the railing that lines the pool deck, lean against it. I take out a cigarette and light it, turn around and look at the water of Lake Ontario.

  Everything is in its right place, but it doesn’t fit. Whatever it was before, this round thing that I was a part of, seems broken now.

  Leaning against the railing doesn’t get me far enough. I want to dangle.

  Sailboats dot the lake, their sails puffed fat in the wind. Someone taps me on the shoulder and I turn around. Jay.

  “So, dude. How was your trip?”

  “Yeah. Uh. It was good. Happy birthday.”

  “HELLO?”

  “Hello.”

  “Hey, Sarah.”

  “Welcome home.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Where are you?”

  “In the market. Walking Greg’s hound.”

  “I see. It’s good to hear your voice.” “Yeah, you too.” So …

  “I thought I would leave you to visit with everyone at the pool party. Thought it might be a bit much.”

  “Yeah. Thanks. It was.”

  “So. Glad
to be back?”

  “Yeah, I think so. I don’t know.”

  “Are you sleeping?”

  “No. Not really … Parker! Come here!”

  “Sounds like you’ve got your hands full.”

  “I think he just ate a pigeon skeleton.”

  “Gross.”

  “Definitely. Except, well, at least it’s a pigeon.”

  “Still a pigeon hater.”

  “Completely.”

  “Were there pigeons in Sudan?”

  “Yup. And they look exactly the fucking same. One day the last person on earth is going to look around and say, ‘Hey. It’s all pigeons.’ And then they’ll peck his eyes out.”

  “That’s funny.”

  “Yeah.”

  “…”

  “I missed you.”

  “Yeah. Missed you too. Hey, thanks for the packages.”

  “You’re welcome. I’m glad you’re home.”

  “Glad to be home.”

  “I haven’t heard from you for a while. Not since you were coming back from Ethiopia.”

  “Yeah. Sorry for that. I was kinda … suffering, you know? Confused. A moment of weakness, I guess.”

  “I told you it was okay. You could have called any time.”

  “Cool. Thanks.”

  “What are you doing after you walk the hound?”

  “I’ll think I’ll— Parker! Come here! Can you hold on a second?”

  “Sure.”

  “…”

  “…”

  “Sarah? Sorry. Um … I’ve got some stuff to do. Work tomorrow.”

  “Well, I was supposed to leave yesterday. I’m going to the coast for a while, but I had to delay my flight to take care of some things. I leave tomorrow.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  “You want to get together?”

  “You know what? I don’t think I can. I said I would meet Scott. You know he’s driving across Canada in a sno-cone truck, right? He’s in town tonight and I haven’t seen him for a year or so. Plus I’m kinda tired.”

  “I see.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay, James, I’ll let you go.”

  “All right. Good to hear your voice.”

  “Mmm-hmm. You too.”

  “Enjoy the coast.”

  “I will.”

  “Bye.”

  “Bye.”

  31/08: last.

  i am on another airplane, packaged into a tiny seat watching a stewardess deliver tiny packages of food. underneath us, blueblue lake superior. after an evening emergency shift, i was up early unpacking from my last trip and repacking for this one to edmonton, to see my family. i haven’t been home to alberta for a long time. i miss its wide skies and flat stretching land. i find there some of the breathing room i lack in toronto. most of all, i miss my family.

  this morning i left my apartment in kensington market in a flurry of jangling keys and last-minute grabs, the chaos of my hasty departure tempered by the cool certainty that neither my clothes iron nor the burner of the stove were on. in the four weeks since i have been home, i have used neither. not once.

  the contrast between my life in sudan and the one here is complete. it is like someone took the grand tape loop of my life and cut out six sudan months, then glued it together again. the coming home jubilee is like the going away one was, just in the summer. my friends are the same, my job the same, my apartment the same.

  am i? i can’t tell. i would suspect my friends would answer yes. over-busy, always packing or unpacking, an overarching interest in frisbee. my outside is ok. inside, i don’t know. i haven’t taken the proper pause. there is a hard spot right here, right where paola pointed when i stood in the kitchen leaning against the dirty counter trying to neither think nor feel, and it sits there like a stone.

  most of the time i think i am ok, but then i write a line or two about standing in the compound kitchen, and i can feel the trickles of sweat on the back of my neck.

  i haven’t been able to go back through the blog yet. i haven’t looked at it, except to read the latest comments. i’m not ready to live the technicolor reality of it. but i have to. i’ve been given a chance to turn this into a book, and need to get started, need to find out what i have left behind.

  so that’s my latest and last news. i haven’t told many people, and do not plan to. i don’t want everyone to know. posting the news seems different.

  the book will not be the blog. it will be different. the blog was a living thing, kept alive by all of us. if i took it, printed it out, and bound it, it wouldn’t be the same. it would be an inanimate version: still, frustrated, lifeless.

  the book will be more careful, i will have more time to write about things i had only seconds for in abyei. i am excited for it. not just for the chance to write, not just because i look forward to distilling my thoughts until they are clear, not just for the chance to unclench the spot paola pointed to in the kitchen, but also for the life that i will need for the book to happen. it will mean fewer last-minute grabs, more slowness. for now, i need to rely on this blue-seated airborne prison in order for me to pen you a letter. may this pass.

  30,000 feet below, manitoba’s land is bound by white gravel roads and green looping belts of rivers. i will be in alberta soon. i haven’t seen my brother in forever. his wife is about to have a baby. we will play frisbee and talk about that. later, i will travel north to where my grandparents live. i have heard that my grandfather has made a map detailing every moose my family has hunted over the past 60 years. i hope to go walking with him and learn more about where i am from, so i can know better my home. and maybe for the first time since abyei, i can find some slowness. may it last.

  MY KEYS FALL OUT OF MY pocket and jangle onto the floor. I pick them up, put them into the lock. The door is already open.

  “Oh yeah. My housekeeper is here. She’s going to love this.”

  “What?” Jack asks.

  “Tearing apart my stereo and throwing my records all over the floor.”

  “But that table is perfect for the DJ booth,” Ryan says.

  “Perfect,” Jack says.

  “Yeah. It is,” I agree.

  “I promise, tomorrow, after we’re done cleaning up from the party, I’ll help you put it all back together,” Mike adds.

  “Yeah, right.”

  We start down the hallway.

  “Hey, shoes, shoes. Show some respect.”

  We climb the stairs.

  “Helloooo. Merl? It’s Dr. James.”

  I pass my room. Merl looks up in surprise.

  “Oh, Dr. James! You startled me. I didn’t expect you home,” she says, holding her hand over her chest.

  “Sorry. Didn’t mean to. We’ve come to undo all of the work you’ve done in the spare room and leave a terrible mess behind.”

  “Oh, that’s okay.”

  I look around my bedroom. The bed has been moved. My dresser too. The suitcases, once under my boxspring, are now stacked in the corner.

  “I wanted this to be a surprise. I hope you’re not angry,” she says.

  “No. It’s good. I’ll let you get back to it.”

  Weird.

  I enter my other room. Someone has already moved my stereo to the floor. Thump. I watch my records slide out into a fan. We unplug the RCA cables, the power cords, leave them in a bunch.

  “One, two, three.” Jack and Mike lift the broad wooden table and start to carry it downstairs. As they turn the corner, a rear leg catches the wall and draws a long scratch.

  “Sorry.”

  “Sorry.”

  I go back to my bedroom.

  “Merl, don’t worry about the spare room. I’ll clean it up when I get back. It’s a mess.”

  “Okay, Dr. James,” she says sheepishly.

  I haven’t met her before. Only left checks. And notes. She has been helping me out since I got back, more than a month ago. She is in her forties, with peppered gray hair and long trailing earrings. She speaks with a soft
Caribbean lilt. I sit down on the wooden chair in my room.

  “You mentioned in one of your notes that you weren’t sleeping very well, and I keep on hearing the pipes bang behin’ this wall, and thought that it would be better if your head was against this one.”

  I nod.

  “And then when I moved it, I saw all these bags under your bed. Now, Dr. James, a body can’t breathe good if his bags are where he is sleeping. They make him dream about leaving.”

  I nod again.

  “You need to make your home a sanctuary. I know where you just came back from; you were helping my people. The other James told me. He’s my client too, you know.”

  She puts a book she had in her hand on my bed.

  “Now there’s something you should know about me, Dr. James. I don’t just clean people’s houses. I help them take care of themselves.”

  I don’t know what to say. I haven’t given myself a minute since I came back. Not one. Running, running, running. I wanted to run so much that I am worn out, huffing, exhausted, dreamless. Then this kindness, my bed from one wall to the other. For a minute, I can’t really speak.

  “Merl. I don’t … um … I guess it’s … uh … I mean, thank you.”

  She stands in the middle of the room, resting one arm on my frayed broom, and looking right at me. Right at me. I tell her everything.

  EPILOGUE

  I’M IN ABYEI. IN THE HOSPITAL.

  Mohamed walks across the small hall to the operating theater and I follow him. He is trying to get the key into the lock. It always sticks.

  I tap him on the shoulder. He turns around.

  “Mohamed. Have you ever intubated someone before? No? Sometimes it is best to look in a dead person’s mouth, to see the anatomy. In case you need to do it one day and I’m not around. Do you want … I mean … we could … with her …”

  His eyes widen. He is shaking his head no. No. Of course not.

  Mohamed unhooks the lock and steps inside the operating theater, a tangle of intravenous tubing in his hand. I stand there for a second, then turn around to help Antonia clean the woman’s body.

  The curtain that hangs in the door frame gusts with the wind, and I can see the bent legs of a man on the bed just outside.