Donna Has Left the Building

by Susan Jane Gilman

  Local farmers had trucked in cases of tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, red onions, all dew-washed and paint-box bright. The makeshift kitchen staff was now preparing Greek salad on an industrial scale.

  “Hey, Lady Chop-Chop is back,” Cathy said. “Not a moment too soon. We’ve got a new crew in here that can use some training.”

  I glanced around. “Where’s Safi?” The tables inside the tavern had been moved back into place. They were filled again with diners—refugees, journalists, volunteers. The only evidence that people had slept in the restaurant was a large plastic tarp pulled over a pile of blankets behind the silverware station.

  “He and his family left an hour ago. They finally got onto a bus to Moria.”

  “Oh.” I felt a stab of grief. I hadn’t even gotten to say good-bye, to wish him well.

  “Fingers crossed,” said Cathy. “Safi has a brother in Germany, so they might have a chance.”

  I thought of Safi with his graceful chef’s hands and ten-year-old Massoud with his earnest smile, hoping to get asylum in the country my own grandparents had fled.

  “Well, Godspeed,” I said quietly. Amir was stacking boxes of milk on the counter by the coffee machine.

  “Hey Lady Chop-Chop.” He fist-bumped me. “Merharba.”

  “Merharba.”

  At first, I’d thought Amir was one of the anarchists. But Selena had told me no, he was a refugee from Aleppo. A newlywed. His bride had drowned on their crossing from Turkey. He’d been in Skala Sikamineas ever since, serving as a translator, helping out wherever needed, keeping vigil over the water, unable to move on. He tickled the children, played YouTube videos he’d saved on his smartphone of World Wide Wrestling bloopers to make them laugh, sang around the fires at night in the square. Yet his eyes looked like cigarette burns. He could not be older than twenty-two.

  “Today, on George’s roof, my friend, we see lots of activity on the coast,” he informed me. George was a fisherman across the street. He and Amir had set up a telescope on his roof to monitor the Turkish coast and anticipate arrivals. “Many boats will come tonight.”

  “Okay, then,” I said. I pulled out a cutting board.

  “Okay then, my friend.” He looked at the knife on the counter, the basket of onions. He tilted his head at me strangely. He pointed to my eye. “You are okay? Somebody hurt you, my friend?”

  It took me a moment to realize that my concealer had worn off. My bruise was now lemon-lime. I shook my head. “Just an accident. Nothing at all.”

  “Ice, she is good. So is honey.” He smiled weakly. “That is what my wife, she used, when we run out of medicine.” With a small shrug, he turned away quickly and headed out to the harbor to help prepare for rescues.

  All these people unmoored in the world, so vulnerable and alone.

  Even my own children. There was so much of their lives I didn’t know anymore. I kept thinking about Ashley that night on the beach. If she hadn’t gotten robbed—or sick—I might never know now that she was even on Lesvos. And Austin, with all his mysterious comings and goings back home. Was he adrift? I should’ve figured things out. I should’ve known more.

  I ducked out of the kitchen. Up the street at the hotel, I got the Wi-Fi password from the receptionist and settled myself on the steps with my phone. It was morning in the US now. The connection was weak, so I used only the audio on Skype.

  “Mooomm?” Austin sounded sleepy. I pictured him in his room so far away, sitting on his bed in a grimy T-shirt, sorting through a mountain of clothes. “Hey. ’Sup?”

  “Hey sweetie,” I said as brightly as I could. I pinched the sides of my nose by the tear ducts.

  “You guys see the real Parthenon yet?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Like, not the one in Nashville.”

  “Oh. No, not yet.”

  “But Ashley’s okay? I scanned her birth certificate.”

  “Yeah, she’s okay.” I exhaled. “Listen, Austin. How are you?”

  I heard the kissing sound and metallic clink of the refrigerator door opening, ketchup and orange juice bottles rattling against one another. He was having breakfast. “I’m okay. Hey Mom. When you were in jail the other night, like, which one was it?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “When you made your ‘one phone call,’ Dad said the line got disconnected, so he didn’t know where you were. He had me do a Google search of all the jails near Nashville. So I was just wondering.”

  The things that interested a sixteen-year-old boy. “I spent one night in the beautiful Dickson County Jail in Charlotte, Tennessee, Austin.”

  I heard him close the refrigerator. “Whoa. That one got pretty decent Yelp reviews, actually.”

  People were rating their jail time on Yelp?

  Two young boys exited the mini-mart beside the hotel. They passed me speaking Arabic, their flip-flops caked in dried mud. The taller one was balancing a six-pack of bottled water on his shoulder.

  “It was pretty funny, actually. I posted it on Instagram.” Over the line, I heard the soft rustle of a cereal box shaking.

  “Austin, you know something? The reason I got arrested was because I had your Adderall on me. The cops in Tennessee thought I was selling it. They charged me with ‘Possession with intent to distribute.’”

  “Oh my God, Mom. LMFAO. That is, like, insane.” I heard a clink, a spoon dinging against the side of a cereal bowl. “I mean, that’s like busting you for Red Bull.”

  “Well, actually, no. Adderall has the same basic molecular structure as crystal meth.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Austin. Sweetie. You’re not selling it to your friends or anything, are you? Not even, casually, like, once in a while for a test?”

  “Uh, no?” he said warily. “My friends have their own Adderall.”

  I stared up at the impossibly blue sky. I took a deep breath. “And you’re not, like huffing or anything, are you?”

  “What?”

  “A lot of times, when you’ve come home late, or I’ve been in your room collecting laundry, I’ve smelled these chemicals, and—it’s like your sister—she’s supposed to be in London, but then I find out she’s in Lesvos—”

  “Jesus, Mom. Why are you being like this? I’m not doing drugs. I’m not being Ashley—”

  “I don’t know where you are half the time, Austin. And this world, I’m seeing, it can be a really precarious place.”

  “Well, I don’t know where you are half the time, either, Mom. Like, are you at a chicken-wing-eating contest? Or playing guitar in Nashville? Or suddenly in prison?” He said this with more than a little anger. “Are you even coming home?”

  I felt my eyes tear up. “Sweetie, I just don’t want to be a bad mother, you know, who forgets to pay attention. I don’t want you to feel lost, or to think you can’t come to me.”

  “Okaaay.”

  “How’s your Odyssey rap going?”

  I heard a faucet jerk on; Austin’s voice was suddenly obscured by a static of water, then a clatter of silverware. “Uh, Mom, I’m, like, about to miss the bus.”

  “Oh. Oh, okay.”

  “Try to have a good time in Greece. My English teacher says it’s awesome.” His voice was gentler now.

  “Okay, Austin,” I said. “I love you.”

  “Love you, too, Mom,” he said quickly.

  There was an abrupt, chiming blip. After he hung up, I sat there on the steps tapping my phone against my knee. I heard a distant voice calling out something in Greek, the mournful dinging of fishing boats bobbing in the marina. Love you too, he’d said.

  Slowly, dabbing my eyes with my apron, I dialed Brenda’s number over Skype.

  “Hey, milady,” she said, picking up on the third ring. “Did you make it to Greece?”

  “Wow. You really are psychic.”

  “Well, you’re the only person who ever calls me on my landline.”

  I heard a metallic rattling in the background.

  “Is this a ba
d time, Bren?”

  She gave a fluttery laugh. “No worse than any other. I just got off a night shift in the ICU, and Eli just informed me that he’s supposed to bring twenty-three enchiladas for his class luncheon today. They’re doing a unit on Mexico, apparently.”

  “Oh good God. Twenty-three?”

  “The school sent an email, I guess—”

  “Two words, Bren: ‘frozen food.’ Get a couple of boxes of El Charrito chicken enchiladas, stick ’em in a pan, doctor ’em up with some extra cheese, and voilà. Trust me. That’s how I got away with school potluck lunches for years.”

  “Wow. And you’re a top culinary ambassador! Okay! But this isn’t why you’re calling. How’s Ashley? Did you find her? Is she okay?”

  “Well, if ‘driving me crazy’ means she’s okay, she’s okay. She wasn’t assaulted in any way, which is a huge relief. Her fever seems to be gone. But even for her, she’s emaciated.”

  “Did the drugs help?”

  “Yes. Thank you so much for that, milady.” Before I left Memphis, I’d called Brenda to apologize—and, well, just to talk. She, of course, was thinking clearly in ways that I was not: “Ashley’s trapped in a refugee camp?” she’d said. “Okay. Make a list, you’re going to want lice shampoo, scabies medication, hand sanitizer, Lomotil, dehydration tablets. Emergency antibiotics—just in case.” She’d insisted on dialing in a prescription for Cipro to Walgreen’s in Memphis—in my name this time! Totally legit!—for me to pick up before my flight out that evening. Since she’d once lived in London, she even advised me about British over-the-counter medications I could pick up during my layover at Heathrow, if need be. Of course, the pharmacists there at the terminal spoke English, too. But having the recommendations come from Brenda, and hearing her voice, was enormously comforting. And if Alonso Jimenez had mentioned to her that his Propecia had gone missing from her medicine cabinet, well, she didn’t say.

  Now I said, “Oh, Bren, we’re in the middle of this global crisis. Boats and refugees are literally washing up at our feet. It’s heartbreaking. It’s surreal. But Ashley and I are still bickering like a mother and daughter in a shopping mall.”

  Brenda gave a bark of laughter. “Sorry,” she said after a moment. “Sweetie, what did you expect? Look at me and my mom.”

  I moaned. “How is your mom, Bren?”

  “Oh, Dr. Peebles Sr. is still her same charming self. Yesterday, I brought her a gorgeous bouquet—peach roses, stargazer lilies. She looked at me and said, ‘You never did have good taste.’”

  “Jesus, Bren,” I joked. “What’s wrong with these women in our lives? Could they just be a little more civil to us while we’re helping them? It’s a good thing we’re not all stuck in one of these rubber rafts out here. Can you imagine?”

  Brenda laughed. “My mother would be like, ‘I’m sorry, lifeguard. But that’s an ugly wetsuit you’re wearing. Get that thing away from me!’”

  “Ha! And my daughter would be like, ‘Is that life preserver made from any animal products at all, because if so—’”

  We both cackled.

  “It’s human nature.” Brenda sighed. “Being rescued can be humiliating. Some people lash out.”

  “But Ashley called me for help.”

  “So did my callers. I saw this all the time as Madame LaShonda Peyroux. I told you how nasty some of them got afterwards. Hey,” she said suddenly. “Speaking of predictions. Now that Ashley’s out of the woods. We never did talk about it in Memphis. But Donna. Did you find him?”

  I squinted toward the harbor, the cobalt Aegean, the amethyst coast of Turkey beyond it. Nashville felt like a wholly different dimension now. There was no one around, but I felt myself redden. “Yeah,” I sighed, scratching the back of my head. “Yeah. I found him all right. Though you probably knew that.”

  “And? Well?”

  “He’s stockpiling dehydrated chicken fajitas and ammo in his bedroom closet. He hasn’t paid his taxes in a decade, and his ex-wife slugged me in the face. But the sex was great and he swears that he loves me. So what could possibly go wrong?”

  “Wow.” She stifled a giggle.

  “Oh, and did I mention? He drinks like a fish. So, put on some Prince for me when you do the ‘I told you so’ dance.”

  Just then, I heard shouting in the distance, followed by the sound of an outboard motor. The proprietor of the hotel ran down the steps past me and toward the marina. I saw figures moving beyond the trees. A commotion. A boat, it seemed, had come in. I didn’t know whether to run toward the port or away from it. Given what Ashley had described, I wasn’t sure how much I myself could handle. I hadn’t signed up for any of this.

  “Brenda, I think I better go.”

  At the marina, I saw Kostas and his brother had pulled in a dinghy that had been deflating at sea. No one had drowned. Some of the newest arrivals were already following Philippe and Inga down the road to the camp. Some huddled in the town square in shock, trying to remain unobtrusive as they gathered their bearings. Some headed directly up the hill for the shuttle buses to Moria. Others, improbably, found seats at the waterfront cafés and settled into tables like tourists who had just disembarked from a pleasure cruise and were now in the mood for a little alfresco lunch.

  What else do you do in those very first hours when you arrive in a foreign country as a refugee or an immigrant—especially if there are no loved ones to greet you, to take you under their wing? I watched families trying to reassemble into some form of normalcy after weeks…months…years, even, of travel.

  Clearly, more food was needed, but back in the tavern, I found the kitchen nearly empty; Kostas was still out with his boat. There were only a few staff now, all of them staring at the crates of produce, seemingly at a loss. No one was in charge. And, I realized, there wouldn’t be. There wasn’t much authority to be found in Skala Sikamineas. The world had turned its back on the village, leaving the 120 townspeople and thousands of unexpected refugees to fend for themselves. Many of the so-called anarchists who’d come to volunteer here? They were responding to lawlessness, not promulgating it. They didn’t feel compelled to wait for anyone’s official permission to step into the breach. Work needed to be done, and they just did it. Those were the rules here: Make them. No one else would.

  Who the hell ever thought anarchists would be the ones restoring law and order and saving the world?

  A young blond woman with a nose ring and a lanky man with a reddish goatee were struggling to dice bell peppers. After I helped them avoid chopping their own fingers, I showed two sisters from Pakistan—refugees? Yes, refugees—the most efficient way to dice tomatoes. Then I demonstrated to some local teenagers how to peel cucumbers so they didn’t cut their wrists. As the salads were being assembled, I demonstrated to everyone at the station how to best slice lemons, strain the juice into the bowl, add pinches of salt and herbs, and whisk it all furiously together with olive oil. “See,” I explained as I tilted the bowl, “You get it emulsified like this.”

  Two Spanish volunteers had just shown up. “Hey guys, can I put you with me over on onions?”

  “Ah, so you are Lady Chop-Chop.” One of them grinned. “We hear about you in the camp.”

  “You are so fast,” said the other. “You are like on television.”

  Yet as I began to peel away the fine, papery purple skin, the very fragility of the onion’s wrapping overwhelmed me. The translucency. The delicacy of it. Why was everything beautiful and miraculous in this world so breakable, so easily crushed? The knife shook in my hand. I bent over with my hands on my knees, trying to catch my breath.

  All I wanted to see was my daughter. What she had witnessed. What she had been through alone. I had a horrible premonition that when I returned to our room, I would find it locked. And that she and her things would be gone.

  Dropping my knife, I yanked the strings of my apron and started to pull it off.

  Then, I saw.

  She was leaning against the little framed archway betw
een the kitchen and the bar, chewing her lip, glancing about warily with her arms crossed in a way that suggested she had been there for some time.

  We gazed at each other. A dark fusion. At that exact moment, Dagmar flung open the back door. “Four more boats arriving. Any volunteers?”

  A sturdy young blond woman trooped in behind her with a white nylon rope coiled around her arm. “Has anyone here seen Kostas? Or Amir?”

  “They’re on their boat,” voices chorused from the stove.

  “Oh. Ashley. You are still here. Are you feeling better?” Smiling, the blond girl gave my daughter a quick, awkward half-hug. “Do you want to come to help on the beach?”

  Ashley glanced at me. The girl, I deduced, was her classmate Pernille. My daughter twisted her wrists around uncertainly. “Um. The thing is?” She shifted her weight from one leg to another. “I think, I have to stay here and help my mom?”

  Some of the new arrivals stood up, adjusting their clothing, eager to volunteer. A journalist picked up her camera and followed. The restaurant started to clear out as people followed Pernille and Dagmar to the wharf. It was a relief to see others go. Please, don’t let there be another tragedy, I thought.

  In the now-empty kitchen, Ashley sidled up beside me. “So, like, do you need me?” she said quietly, looking down at the half-chopped onion bleeding red on my cutting board.

  I handed the knife to her. “Here. I’ll go find another.”

  Slowly, I saw, she began making lengthwise incisions carefully across the onion as I’d demonstrated.

  “Like this?”

  For a couple of minutes we stood side by side, chopping onions quietly in tandem. We each began to sniffle, blot our eyes with our wrists. At the sink, we splashed cold water on our faces, then regarded each other puffy-eyed.

  “Thanks for staying behind to help,” I said.

  “Yeah, well.” She kicked at a flake of wine-dark onion skin stuck to the tiled floor. The new tennis shoes I’d bought her were cheap Converse knockoffs, but rubber-toed and solid. “You did come all this way, so.”