The Girl Who Made Them Pay

by Tikiri Herath

  “How-how do you know all this?” I asked looking up at Tetyana.

  “She told me.”

  “Just like that?”

  “I found a strange bottle of pills in the back of the kitchen cabinet one day and asked her. She grabbed it and hid it under her robe, so I knew something was wrong. When I asked her what was going on, she told me it was her poison. She wanted to kill herself.” She paused. “I don’t blame her.”

  My stomach turned.

  “She was scared because Zero had seen the pills before and told her she’d go straight to hell because their religion doesn’t allow her to kill herself. He said if he saw those pills again, he’d slit her throat himself.”

  I clutched Bibi’s robe even closer to my chest. What a life she’s had.

  It took me a minute to get my tongue working again. “So what happened?”

  “I took the pills away and threw them down the toilet.” Tetyana went quiet for a few seconds. “I thought I could help her somehow. Maybe she’d have been happier...” She stopped herself.

  “Couldn’t she have run away?”

  “I asked her the same thing. Even said I’d help, but she said Zero would have hunted her down with the help of their community. They’d punish her even worse.”

  “How much worse can it get?”

  Tetyana shrugged and let out a sigh. “She was trapped.”

  I tried to let this sink in.

  “Do you know what rape is?”

  I looked up at Tetyana, my brows furrowed. Where’s she going with this?

  “It’s a weapon.”

  I stared at her.

  “It’s the most effective weapon to bring a human being to her knees. It’s like bashing someone with a hammer, again and again, until they submit screaming, until they’d do anything you say. And then you shame them. It’s a double whammy.”

  I was too numb to reply.

  “At the mosque in London, men sit up front and the women always sit in the back. Dishonored girls like Bibi are relegated to the very back if they’re let in at all, just like they don’t allow girls with periods inside. Dirty and contaminated, I was told.”

  I sat back, closed my eyes and took a deep breath in. It was hard to digest all this. Why would any god punish a beaten up and raped little girl even more? What justified this harshness, this violence? What kind of people would treat a vulnerable child with so much venom and hostility?

  I had no answers. But this was not a totally foreign concept to me.

  I remembered when that vile alcoholic man had tried to attack me. I’d fought back and escaped, but Grandma had asked me to never bring it up and then pretended it never happened.

  Even Preeti, my dear, sweet cousin Preeti, had thought it blasphemous to talk about the incident, saying I’d only bring dishonor to myself and my family. It was that man who’d tried to attack me, yet I was the one everyone had blamed.

  Do they blame someone for getting robbed too? I wondered. Or for getting beaten up by thugs on the streets?

  It was then I realized it wasn’t the heinous act that mattered, but the victim. If you’re a girl, whatever happens to you, you’re the one to blame. I shook my head at the stupidity of this.

  What happens to the people who do these terrible deeds, I wondered. Aren’t Zero and his gang the ones who are dirty and contaminated? Why don’t they get sent to the very back of the mosque? Or straight to prison where they belong?

  “Bibi will be fine.” Tetyana leaned back and closed her eyes. “She’s free now.”

  Chapter Twenty-one

  “Guys, I need to get out.” Katy’s voice woke us all up.

  She’d been unusually subdued, sleeping through so much of the trip I wondered if Tetyana had given her a double dose of whatever she’d given me as well.

  “Are you okay?” I asked.

  “Just need to pee,” her strained voice came from the other end of the van. “Really badly.”

  “Hun, you have to hold," Tetyana said. "Toilets and food will come soon.”

  “How soon?”

  “In a few hours.”

  “Hours?”

  “Voici,” Luc said, passing an empty plastic water bottle to her. “Here, use this.”

  Katy took a long look at it and shook her head. “I’ll wait,” she said.

  The thought of hiking up my skirt and peeing into a bottle while huddled so close to the others in the back of a moving van wasn’t appealing. I was holding too. I knew from those long safari trips my parents and I took back in Africa a million years ago, the more you talked about peeing while on the road, the more you wanted to go. It was best to say nothing at all.

  “Don’t feel bad about pee in bottle,” Win spoke up.

  I looked at her. She’d regained some color from when I last saw her laid out on the bed, unconscious. While Win was sleeping, Luc told me she’d been drugged. That fall down the stairs and those nasty kicks from Zero would leave her with bruises, but she was going to be okay, he said.

  As the most injured and the youngest, Win got most of the rations we had at hand. The “rations,” which Tetyana carefully distributed among us through the trip, consisted of ten bottles of water and five Ziplock bags filled with nuts and dried fruit bars. This was what had been in the bags at our feet. One of the bags contained the injection kit Tetyana had used to put us to sleep earlier, but she kept that close and allowed no one to touch it. She obviously had prepared for this. Or had done this before.

  “I peed in bottle for one month,” Win was saying. “Easy to do after practice.”

  “One whole month?” Katy sounded shocked. “Why?”

  “We were in a metal box.”

  “Metal box?” I said, in horror. “For a whole month?”

  “You mean a container, right?” Luc asked. “Like a shipping container?”

  “It was in a ship, yes,” Win said with a nod.

  “What were you doing in a shipping container?” Katy asked.

  Win was silent.

  “Win,” I tried. “Can I ask where you are from?”

  “My home is near Don Dhet in Laos.” I detected a slight pride in her voice, a longing for a home far away.

  “Why did you leave home?”

  Her voice came soft and hesitant. “When I was ten, some Chinese men came in big jeeps and said we will get good jobs in Bangkok. My father said I was going to make a lot of money and took me out of school. I wanted to stay in school but I had to obey my father.”

  “Did he know where you were going to end up?” I asked, almost in a whisper.

  “The Chinese men gave a big, flat television to my father. He was so happy. He said he was an important man in the village now. He said it was payment for me. My mother cried, but no one listened to her.”

  I heard a gasp from Katy on the other end. “Your dad sold you for a TV?”

  I swallowed and wondered, not for the first time that day, how a family member could so easily betray their own daughters, their own sisters. Did they matter so little?

  “What happened when you got to Bangkok?” Katy asked.

  Win was quiet for a moment. “I was in a hotel,” she said, her voice thin, expressionless. “I worked for men. Many men came every day, sometimes twenty in one day.”

  I felt nauseous again. Win’s words had sucked any remaining air from the van.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I’m so sorry.”

  “It’s okay,” she said sweetly. “I wanted to go home, but they put chains on us when we weren’t working.”

  I heard another gasp from Katy.

  I felt like I’d seen and heard enough for one day, without going mad.

  “See my tattoo,” Win said, unfolding one leg. I couldn’t see much from where I was sitting, but I remembered those Chinese characters curving up her thigh.

  “This means I belong to that Chinese group. If they sell you to another group, they give you different tattoo. But Zero said he doesn’t give tattoos. I’m happy because it hurt a
lot when they put it.”

  That’s not a tattoo, Win, I thought trying not to throw up. They branded you like they brand cattle. But I couldn’t say this out loud.

  Next to me, Luc put his head in his hands.

  Tetyana was staring in front of her, her face stone cold.

  Katy reached out, put her arm around Win, and pulled her close.

  “One day, they told us they’ll pay more if we work in a bigger city,” Win continued, leaning her head against Katy’s shoulder. “Supposed to be a better job. No more men, they said. They promised.” It seemed like she wanted to let it all out, and in the confines of the dark van, she may have felt it safe to tell her story. No one stopped her.

  “So, they took us to Pahang.”

  “Where’s that, Win?” I asked softly.

  “That in Malaysia, right?” Luc said.

  “Uhuh. They put us on a boat and we went to Manila. That’s where I saw the big ships. They were so huge, bigger than a building. It was at night and I don’t remember going inside the ship, but they told me that’s where we were going. I remember waking up in the dark and we were inside a big box with other girls from Thai and Laos.”

  “Mon dieu,” Luc whispered. “My god.”

  “How old were you?” I said.

  “I was the oldest. I was ten.”

  I gave an involuntary shiver.

  Tetyana was still silent, but I could see her clenching and unclenching her hands, faster and faster.

  “I was lucky,” Win said. “Four girls didn’t make it. When the men came, they opened the doors to take them out.”

  Luc pulled his knees to his chest and buried his head in them like he didn’t want to hear any more.

  “We heard them splash into the water.”

  Oh my god, I whispered.

  Then, there was silence. It seemed Win had worn herself out. She rested her head on Katy’s shoulders and closed her eyes.

  Everyone else seemed to have lost their voices.

  I leaned back against the panel, trying to digest everything.

  Something about Win’s story stirred a memory from long ago. I was sitting in a classroom, reading a book I couldn’t put down. It wasn’t an ordinary book. Ms. Stacy from Canada, who taught grade six at the international school I’d attended then, assigned books beyond our classroom’s mandatory list. Some had been hard to read because of their advanced language. Others had been hard to read because of their subject like the one I’d held in my hands that day.

  It was a story about a boy who’d been captured in West Africa and sent on a ship with thousands of others to America, where they were sold off to become slaves in plantations. Instead of metal boxes, the boy and his companions were kept in the bottom of the ship.

  Maybe they didn’t have containers back then, I thought, but I understood one thing now. What happened hundreds of years ago, and what everybody claimed was a terrible thing, was still happening today. But no one wanted to talk about it anymore.

  Everyone in the van had either lapsed into their personal nightmares or had fallen asleep.

  All I could hear was the vehicle’s steady hum. When we passed a streetlight, the inside of the van lit up for a split second, long enough for me to glance at the others. We looked like a bunch of discarded refugees who’d trekked through a lifetime of hell. I wanted to reach out and tell everyone that everything was going to be all right. That everything would get back to normal. But what’s normal? To them? To me?

  “Luc,” I whispered, nudging him.

  “Hmm....” He’d been resting his head against the van, eyes half-closed.

  “What about you?”

  “Pardon?”

  What’s your story?”

  “What story?”

  “How old are you?”

  “Seventeen,” he said. I felt my eyebrows lift involuntarily. I’d thought he was the same age as Katy and me. Or at least eighteen.

  “How did you get here?”

  Silence.

  I prodded him. "How did you end up here?”

  He sighed. “I’ve nowhere else to go.” He paused. “I belong here.”

  “Here? With these monsters?” Those words came out before I could think.

  “Better than where I was before.”

  “How can anything be worse than this?”

  Luc shrugged. He turned his back to me and refused to say another word.

  “Sorry,” I muttered.

  I took stock of my own situation. I hadn’t been locked up in a trans-Pacific shipping container, or sold as a prostitute, or raped by a man while my own brother held me down. I’d had some close encounters, but for the most part, I’d gone unscathed. None of my worst experiences even came close to what any of the others here had gone through.

  My curiosity got the better of me and I turned to Tetyana.

  “Tetyana?”

  I knew she wasn’t asleep because she was still clenching and unclenching her hands. She didn’t open her eyes for a whole minute, and when she did, she looked to me with raised eyebrows.

  “It’s strange you look so much like Katy from the back,” I ventured.

  “I’m nothing like her,” she said quietly.

  “It’s not every day you find two redheads in one place,” I said, trying to figure out how to get her to tell her story.

  “You think this my real color?”

  I stared at her.

  “I only give what customers want.”

  I hesitated before asking my next question. “Why are you here?”

  She looked away. “Because I choose to.”

  “Why would you choose something like this?”

  She shook her head and closed her eyes again.

  “Are you related to Vlad?”

  “Absolutely not.” That came out with force.

  I’d met her only a day ago. I knew nothing about her, but I knew she knew this game. She knew the men up front, she knew everyone’s backgrounds, she knew what to do, and most importantly, what not to do. There was something about her. Those hard green eyes, that grim red mouth. One thing was clear. Underneath that bravado and hard shell, Tetyana was hiding something.

  “Hey—” I started, but I didn't get to finish.

  The van screeched to a halt, throwing us all into a topsy-turvy heap against the wall of cardboard boxes.

  “Watch out!” Luc yelled as the boxes came crashing down on us.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Tetyana's and Luc’s lightning-quick reactions saved us. They threw their bodies against the wall of boxes. I leaped up to help them and push the boxes back in place.

  Win and Katy woke up in shock.

  “What’s going on?” Katy asked, her eyes widened.

  Win’s face was white.

  Tetyana put a finger to her lips. Her self-assured look had returned.

  “Halt!”

  The van rocked as the men in front jumped off and slammed their doors. We could hear a mumble of voices outside.

  “The stop sign’s over there,” said a commandeering voice. The voice didn’t sound happy.

  “Sorry sir, we not see it.” I knew from the high-pitched voice it was Vlad.

  “Passports and license papers, please.” Is that a border agent? A police officer?

  “Yes, sir,” Zero and Vlad chorused. The front doors opened and shut again.

  “Transport permits?”

  More mumbling. It sounded like Zero and Vlad were on their very best behavior.

  "Follow me," the voice said.

  We heard the crunch of boots on gravel, walking away from us.

  I sprang to my knees.

  “Hey!” I shouted, startling everyone in the back of the van. I lunged forward with my fists, ready to beat the side panel. But before I could do anything, Tetyana grabbed me and clamped her hand over my mouth. I struggled, but Luc jumped in and held me down by my shoulders.

  “Mmmmm.” I tried to pull away from their grip, but they were both strong.

&nbs
p; “Allez au diable! Stop it!" Luc said.

  “Settle down, Asha,” Tetyana said in a calm voice. "This is not the time for that.”

  I stopped struggling.

  Tetyana’s and Luc's grips softened, and I pulled away from them. Everyone was staring at me.

  “If that’s the police—” I began in an angry voice.

  “It is the police,” Tetyana snapped. “Local police.”

  “Then, we—”

  She cut me off.

  “You think it’s that easy?” she said, with a look of scorn. “All we do is call 911 and everything will become all right? Is that what you think?”

  “What’s wrong with you?” I demanded, glaring back at her. “We did nothing when they killed that girl. Now we’re not gonna do anything when the police are right here? Do you enjoy getting tortured?”

  "Do you enjoy trying to get us killed?” Luc asked in a quiet voice.

  “Asha,” Tetyana said as if gathering all the patience she had in her. “The last thing we want to do is to walk into the hands of these men.”

  “Why?”

  “Well.” She paused. “How do you know they’ll help us?”

  “Because—” I looked at her helplessly. We’re not in India anymore, right? “Because they’re the police. That's why. How do you know they won’t help us?”

  When Tetyana replied, it was in a low, deliberate voice. “There are no border crossings in Europe anymore. At least in the EU.” She paused. “Think about it.”

  “What do you mean?” A sudden chill went up my spine.

  “When legitimate police forces set up traffic stops, they have teams in place who flag you down from afar. You see their lights and you hear them work. They don’t have a single man holding a haphazard stop sign in the middle of an empty road.”

  I stared at her, confused.

  “He heard you, all right,” Tetyana said, her eyes boring into mine. “But he didn’t come get us, did he?”

  I felt like someone just punched me in the stomach.

  The sound of boots crunching on the gravel came back. We instinctively hunched low, even though we were inside the van, behind the wall of boxes.