Godsend

by John Wray

  —Suleyman Al-Na’ama, he said fondly. —I should have had the good sense not to leave you in Sadda. I should have known that it would serve no purpose.

  —Your father said he made you promise not to take me.

  —Did he? I don’t remember. He waved to someone at another table. —I’ve made my father many promises I didn’t mean to keep. Shame on my ungrateful head for that.

  —There’s no shame, she said quickly. —I made my own decision.

  —He’s not likely to see it that way.

  —I don’t care how he sees it.

  —Of course not. He nodded. —But you aren’t his son.

  The din of the hall receded as she returned Ziar’s smile. A dome of light and calm seemed to enclose them. In his expression she saw that her future at the Mountain was still undecided, and she told herself that she was willing to submit to his judgment: to Ziar Khan’s and no one else’s.

  —Who was that man you came with?

  —Which man, little brother?

  —The driver of the other truck.

  He raised his eyebrows. —In this camp his name is Abu Shakt. Why do you ask?

  —I’ve met him before.

  —So I understand.

  —He said you were a liar and a thief.

  Ziar nodded and rose from the table, taking hold of her forearm to help himself up. His grip was less gentle than she remembered. —Brother Suleyman! You almost sound as if you disbelieved him.

  —Is he a comrade of yours? Did you fight the Russians together?

  —Come for a walk, he said, guiding her out of the hall. —Back in Sadda, as I remember it, you asked fewer questions.

  —In Sadda I had fewer problems.

  He laughed. He was a silhouette now with the first stars behind him.

  —That can mean only one thing, Suleyman Al-Na’ama.

  —What’s that?

  —You’re becoming a man.

  They walked past the mosque and the munitions hut and the ditch of the latrines to the beginning of the escarpment, exactly as had happened in her dream. Her fear had long since vanished and her body seemed to float inside her clothes. There were clouds to the south, rolling in from the lowlands, and the lights of Mansehra turned them a bilious green. She tried to concentrate on what Ziar was telling her. She fought the urge to take him by the hand.

  —When we left the madrasa I was tempted to wake you, little brother, but I’m a better son than that, praise be to God. Your friend Ali urged me to do it. You mustn’t think badly of him. He said more than once that you’d make a better fighter than he would. Ziar shook his head. —Within a few days I believed him.

  —He’s right, she said. —I would, Ziar. I will.

  He paused a moment, looking back the way they’d come. —We crossed the border on foot, as is the custom. There is a camp there, a small one, not three hours into tribal territory. But your friend Ali had told me fairy stories. He claimed to have fired small arms, and to know how to care for a rifle, and his cousin Yaqub abetted him in these falsehoods. Yaqub is a well-intentioned man and a dependable soldier, Suleyman, but he is easily misled. They caused me no small embarrassment in that place, the two of them. No small measure of trouble.

  —Trouble? she said.

  —I chose to hold Brother Altaf accountable, which I still consider just. He was the most deceitful of the three. He told no end of lies when I confronted him, Suleyman, not least about you. You won’t be sharing the midday meal with him again, I’m sad to say. Or with his brother.

  —Why is that?

  —Because they are no longer of our party.

  A thin rain began falling as they clambered up the slope. She was certain now that Ziar was pleased to see her and she barely felt the burning in her legs. She told herself that she had his confidence, that he would never have spoken so unguardedly with the earnest bearded men who shared his table, and the joy this notion brought her made the night go very still. She felt no fatigue. She could have kept on for hours. It was only after they’d reached the crest of the escarpment and begun to descend that she realized she’d barely thought of Decker.

  —What about Ali?

  —What about him?

  She hesitated. —Did you leave him there too? Or did you send him home?

  —Home to where, little brother?

  She stepped past him so he couldn’t see her face. —I’m sure whatever you chose to do was right.

  —And I am duly honored by your trust.

  —I’m only asking—

  —I did less to him, Suleyman Al-Na’ama, than a liar deserves.

  She opened her mouth but said nothing.

  —Suleyman.

  —Yes?

  —He’s been in the infirmary since we arrived. The water here does not agree with him.

  She felt herself shiver. —He’s here? At the Mountain?

  —Go to him, little brother. Go to him and keep him company. Perhaps you’ll find a chance to teach him how to aim a rifle.

  —Ali’s not a liar, she mumbled. —Not really. He just thinks a thing is true if he says it enough.

  —I see. And how do you know this?

  —I just do, that’s all. She started downhill, sliding over the scree. —Maybe sometimes I feel that way myself.

  —Go to him, Ziar called after her. —But bear in mind, Suleyman, what the Prophet has told us.

  —What’s that?

  —For all you know, you may love something, and it is harmful to you.

  * * *

  She found Decker asleep in the infirmary with a white enamel bucket within arm’s reach of his cot. The bucket’s rim was chipped and encrusted with age-blackened filth and she pushed it away with the sole of her foot and bent down beside him. The violence of her happiness amazed her. After a while he shifted and sighed to himself, almost too faintly to hear, and she sat down on the cot and spoke his name.

  —For fuck’s sake, Sawyer, he said without opening his eyes. —Tell me you’re not really sitting there.

  She laid a hand on his shoulder. It felt wasted and cool. —I’ll tell you anything you want to hear.

  —All right then. He let out a breath. —Say I’m back in Santa Rosa. Tell me I’m as fat as Biggie Smalls and watching Kathie Lee Gifford on TV. Tell me my shit doesn’t look like dirty Pepsi.

  —All true, she said. —Except for that last part. I can’t help you there.

  —I always had a crush on Kathie Lee. At last it can be told.

  —I don’t believe that for a second.

  —Believe it, pilgrim. She had that hot-mom thing going on. Like first she’d bake you a big tray of brownies, then she’d take you somewhere, like into the laundry room, maybe, and—

  —Are they taking care of you? Is there some kind of a doctor?

  —Look around, Sawyer. He laughed. —They dump you in here and see if you can make it back out. If you’re lucky they give you a bucket.

  —Can I ask you something?

  —I thought I was the one asking the questions around here.

  —Ziar told me something happened to Altaf.

  Decker lay back on the folded towel that served him as a pillow. —You never liked him anyway.

  —What happened?

  He stared up at the ceiling for a time before he answered.

  —It all just went down the crapper. I mean right away, Sawyer. Before we’d even crossed the border. I’m a goddamn idiot. I’m lucky I’m not facedown in some ditch.

  She smiled at him. —You smell as if you are.

  —They killed him, Sawyer. They took him out and shot him in the head.

  A tapping carried to them through the wall behind the cot. The admissions office was on the other side and she heard the clatter of the old electric Remington and the mournful droning of the air conditioner. The floor beneath her was bisected by a dark and ancient stain. She touched a palm to the wall and it came away wet.

  —Who’s they? she said finally.

  He seemed not to hear
. —I was ten feet away when they did it. Maybe not even that. They didn’t even have the decency to take him off somewhere.

  —Would that have been better?

  —What do you mean?

  —Would it have been better if they’d done it somewhere else?

  —Fuck you, Sawyer, he said, turning his face to the wall. —You didn’t have to see it. You weren’t there.

  —That’s true, she said. —I wasn’t. You left me behind.

  He made a small choked noise that could have had any meaning she chose to assign it and curled up again and lay still. —I want to go home, he whispered.

  It took her a moment to answer. —You should go home, Decker. You should go home as soon as you can.

  —They’ve got my passport and everything. They’ve got all my money.

  —We’ll figure it out, she said. —I’ll talk to them.

  She sat beside him on the cot and ran her fingers through his hair. The tapping of the Remington continued without pause and she asked herself what manner of report or decree or manifesto was being drafted on the far side of the wall. It dawned on her that she had no way of knowing, no way even to guess, and the thought brought tears of panic to her eyes. She stared at the thin cold thread of light beneath the door, willing herself to see the truth for which the rituals of the camp were merely symbols. God was in that place, or the submission to God’s will, or perhaps only the desire to submit, which was the highest form of love that she could give. Not the submission itself but the desire. She listened to the pull and sigh of Decker’s breathing. It didn’t matter what was happening on the far side of the wall. Her duty was clear to her at last, or clear enough. She had no other family, no other love, no other calling. He was the only person in the world who knew her. Her duty was to keep him safe from harm.

  * * *

  All that week she devoted herself to her training with a fervor that caused even Abu Imam to sing her praises. She learned to set land mines and to lay trip wires for IEDs and to dismantle them in such a way that they could be wrapped in squares of thick gray felt and used again. Her fingers were smaller than the others’, more nimble and precise, and she was given the task of checking the shearing pin and resetting the safety on the plastic antitank mines that had proven so effective in the fight against the Russians. She practiced marksmanship and tracking and began to study Pashto. Each day after fourth prayers she visited Decker in the infirmary and told him what she’d learned, and eventually he began to pay attention. At times his former bluster would flicker to life, especially when he asked about the mines and IEDs, and by the end of the week he was treating her with good-natured contempt whenever anyone was near. She offered solemn thanks to God for this small mercy. Within a fortnight Decker was able to get to his feet without her help, and the next day he left the infirmary. He made no further mention of escape.

  The following Juma’a at dawn prayer she caught sight of Ziar at the entrance to the mosque, silhouetted by first light, watching Decker with a look of steady interest. His half-smile might have been meant for her, or for Decker, or even for the red-bearded Chechen who was leading the prayer, and she thought to herself that this was one of the qualities that made him a leader of men: his smile applied to everyone and no one. And still she knew in her most secret self that what bound her to him now was theirs alone. She looked at Decker beside her, mumbling intently along with the Chechen’s clumsy Arabic, then turned her head again, not caring who might see her, to return Ziar’s smile. But now Ziar was nowhere to be seen.

  Within a few days Decker was well enough to begin his formal training and her standing with Abu Imam was such that she was able to persuade him, after a lengthy discussion, to admit Decker into his group. She vouched for his probity and his zeal as a Muslim and promised that she’d keep him out of trouble. She hadn’t laid Abu Imam’s doubts to rest, not fully, but that made no difference. All that mattered was that he’d agreed.

  Decker was faltering and awkward at first, as Ziar had described, but he showed a grim resolve that she could never have foreseen. His illness had changed him. He rarely spoke now, not even to her, and forced himself to eat the rancid rations that the others barely touched. Although he was excused from the midmorning run up the escarpment he insisted on climbing as high as he could and spent the rest of the hour sheltering from the wind, blue-lipped and shaking from exhaustion, cleaning the antiquated rifle he’d been issued. It was a Degtyarev DP, a Russian light machine gun from the first half of the century, but he seemed not to notice its age or its weight or the Kalashnikovs that everyone else carried. Abu Imam began to tease Ziar, in the evenings, with anecdotes of Brother Ali’s boldness and devotion to jihad. Ziar nodded cheerfully and wished him all the best.

  * * *

  They were laying antipersonnel mines along the bluff above the compound when she caught sight of two elderly men in kaftans struggling slowly up the slope. Ziar followed just behind them, dressed all in white, as if for the Day of Assembly. Some form of premonition or foreboding brought her up onto her feet. Ziar made a gesture and Abu Imam brought his cupped hands together and called out her name. It was happening too quickly. She watched them as if she were watching the news. Abu Imam frowned and called to her again. The foreboding grew stronger. She looked over her shoulder at Decker. He raised his head for a moment, stared down the slope blankly, then turned back to the channel he was cutting in the clay.

  —You’ve done well in the course, little brother, said Abu Imam when she reached him. —You’ve distinguished yourself. It is for this reason that these gentlemen are here.

  —I know that, Abu Imam. And I thank you.

  —You know this? The smile left his lips. —What else do you imagine that you know, Suleyman Al-Na’ama?

  —Only what you’ve taught me, she said distractedly, bringing her hand to her heart. She was picturing Decker behind her. Abu Imam seemed about to say something further, perhaps even to embrace her, but instead he stepped aside to let her pass.

  Ziar and the men in the kaftans were waiting on a ledge of level ground. The men gave their names as Abu Bakhsh and Abu Hamza and she knew as they began questioning her in their dignified, weary voices that her time with Abu Imam was at an end. They asked about her tenure at the Mountain, her understanding of scripture, the extent of her familiarity with explosives and small arms. The sun was behind her and they bobbed their heads in unison and squinted as though she was hard to see. Ziar kept his distance, observing the proceedings with an air of amused detachment, like a precocious young merchant waiting for his elders to review a bill of sale.

  When the men were done Ziar thanked them and led her with a flourish away from the mine course to a bend in the road where a battered blue pickup stood idling. A Pashtun boy she seemed to recognize sat slumped behind the wheel. He awoke with a start when Ziar rapped on the windshield and stammered an apology and skittered up the road and disappeared. She was glad to see him go.

  She stood with Ziar by the clattering hood and they looked westward together down the long narrow curve of the valley. No one else was in sight. The day was exceptionally clear and she saw or imagined the spires of a city at the margins of her vision, past the far northern summits, where there wasn’t and could never be a city. The truck coughed and grumbled. A line of pockmarks edged the wheelwell where a spray of bullet holes had been patched over. The putty was cracked and discolored and collared with rust. She counted seven rounds in all. She ran her fingertips lightly along them.

  —They tried their best, those two grandfathers, Ziar said with mock solemnity. —But you outplayed them, Suleyman. Congratulations.

  —I didn’t know we were playing.

  —Didn’t you?

  The need to please him in that moment was as urgent as a cramp. —I’m sorry, she heard herself answer. —I think I’m confused.

  —You’re a child still, he said. He glanced back toward the compound. —This makes your case difficult. To those graybeards you seem practically a
baby.

  —There are plenty of boys up here younger than me, she said quickly.

  —Such is the case, Suleyman. There are many young boys. But none have yet been brought across the border.

  She took her tongue between her teeth. He expected no answer. He was in a patient frame of mind and she gave thanks for the reprieve.

  —Most in this camp are of the opinion that my faith in you is misplaced, he said. —Abu Imam is the only exception.

  —What are they saying about me?

  His smile was almost sheepish. —Some have told me that I am besotted, that my thinking is troubled. As if you were a dancing boy from Kandahar, little brother, and I were a wrinkled old degenerate, taking opium with my tea. He reached past her and grasped the door handle. —Am I an opium eater, Suleyman? Tell me truthfully. Are you a dancing boy?

  She held her hand over the engine block and felt the heat run smoothly up her arm into her chest. She kept it there as long as she could stand it.

  —No, she told him finally. —I’m not a dancing boy.

  —I’m grateful to you for saying so, said Ziar, pulling open the door. —Now get in.

  They rode in silence down the valley until the crushed clay of the roadway turned to tar. Never had she seen or heard or felt with such precision. Her body was a girl’s body still and it felt far too much but that mattered only if she chose to listen. She looked out the window and watched the hills passing. They meant more to her than her frail body did. Her forgettable body. They were fractured and dark and they fluttered like wings.

  * * *

  The hills fell away and the suburbs enclosed them. The speed of it dazed her. At a nondescript turn on an avenue of stucco-fronted houses Ziar rolled to a stop and sat back and braced his palms against the dash. She waited for him to look at her but his attention was devoted to the street. It was paved in fitted concrete slabs and graded at its edges and its curbs and trees and sidewalks all looked lovingly maintained. Aside from a fine yellow film on the windshield there was no trace of the dust they’d driven through. They might have been in some sleepy California suburb. The whitewashed houses shone so brilliantly it almost hurt to look.