Let's Go Swimming on Doomsday, page 28
“Abdiweli,” he says again, when I don’t speak.
The plane keeps moving, getting smaller, farther away.
I keep my eyes on my reward, which is now slipping into the darkness. “My chip isn’t at the bottom of the ocean,” I say.
I can feel Jones stiffen behind me, the meaning of my words sinking in.
In my mind I embrace the Doctor as we sit in his boat, and he is telling me not to doubt myself. I whisper, “God’s will be done,” as I press the chip onto the fabric of his shirt. I made sure to place it on his back, under his collar where it wouldn’t be seen. Bashir gave me the glue, and I applied it as we motored toward the Doctor’s boat.
“He wanted to watch the explosion,” I tell Jones. “From a boat in the harbor. That’s why it looked like I was in the water. He’ll be gone by now, but he can’t have gotten too far. Just follow my chip’s signal. You’ll find him.” But Jones is barely listening anymore. He’s already at the doorway, shouting orders to pull my location up on the screen and for someone to radio the team to get ready.
I don’t take my eyes off the plane. It’s still on the ground. Still connected to me through billions of little molecules of sand and earth. Once they lift into the air, that connection is cut. The shouts and commands filling the other room are a fog of distant noise.
“Tell them to take off,” I say, but my voice is lost.
I put the goggles down and follow Jones, who’s shouting into his phone, signing a stack of papers with a frantic scrawl. The soldiers around him have doubled in number, running back and forth to monitors and stations.
One of them shouts up from his computer, “Sir, we have eyes on the target. His boat’s on the move, about six kilometers north of Lido Beach.”
“Tell them to take off,” I say again to Jones, in a voice I force to be heard over the din.
Jones looks up, pen poised, phone still to his ear. But for a second I have his entire attention. For that brief moment something passes over his face. It’s as if he suddenly sees all of this for what it really is. He sees that he’s an old, tired man. A grown-up bully who just moved onto a bigger playground. Maybe he truly believes that he’s here to make things better. But for this one moment he understands exactly what that costs. He sees what he’s broken in the process of trying to fix us all. Who he’s broken. He says into the handset, “Charlie-One, you have permission to take off.”
* * *
• • •
IN THE other room the soldiers shout with excitement. It can only mean one thing.
I’d stood forgotten, watching the monitors as the SEAL team closed in. Each of the SEALs was a red beacon on the screen as they swam in under the Doctor’s boat. At this point one of Jones’s men decided that this wasn’t the sort of thing I should be allowed to see, and I got closed back up in the room overlooking the empty airfield. It doesn’t matter. I don’t need to see this part.
The plane is in the air.
My family, gone.
That’s all that really matters.
Isn’t it?
Through the door I could still hear the voices over the screen feeds as the SEAL team came out of the water. Gunshots. Shouting, both here and there. The roar of boat engines. Orders barked by Jones. Orders relayed between the SEALs. Mangled chaos, all the noises coming from everywhere and nowhere all at once.
The final triumphant words from afar: “Target is in hand. Alive and neutralized.”
The eruption of cheers.
I sink into a chair and stare out the window. I wait to feel sad, or happy, or anything at all.
I feel nothing.
* * *
• • •
“WHAT WILL you do with him?” I ask Jones. He sits beside me, smoking, looking out the window. The other room is still celebrating. Someone has turned on music and everyone is shouting along. Part of me wonders why he isn’t in there celebrating. Most of me doesn’t care.
Jones doesn’t answer. I knew he wouldn’t. It’ll be some secret place like the Hole, then. A place where men like the Doctor are tucked away, never to be heard from again.
I can see our blurry reflections in the dark window, like two worn-out ghosts. It seems like it should be daylight already. It feels like an eternity has passed since the sun set, but it’s only 0100 hours. My hand is wrapped in white bandages, the best the medic could do until I can get to a proper hospital. He gave me some painkillers, so I don’t hurt. But even if I did, with all that’s happened, my hand would still be low on a long list of things crowding my brain.
“You did well tonight, Abdiweli,” Jones says.
Something in his voice makes me look up at him. He’s frowning into the night.
“You don’t sound satisfied,” I say.
“No, it was a successful mission. It’s just . . .”
“What?” What more could Jones possibly want? I wonder bitterly.
He shakes his head. “Nothing.”
I don’t press. I couldn’t care less what Jones is worried about now. My family is safe. Dahir will get better, I tell myself. I should feel relieved. It’s finally over. I never have to go back to the Fort, or carry a gun again. Soon I’ll be in America, starting a new life. But somehow all I can think about is Safiya. She’ll be waiting for Bashir at the border, and he’ll never show. How long will she wait? Will she think he’s abandoned her?
“Bashir could have cut his chip out too,” I say, mostly to myself. “He could have smashed it. He could be anywhere.”
His chip has stopped registering on Jones’s system. Jones makes a noncommittal noise. My anger rekindles. Obviously he doesn’t care whether Bashir is alive.
Forget Jones, I tell myself. Think of Hooyo and the others. It’s time to wrap this up and get out of here. “When can I join my family?” I ask.
Jones takes a slug from a paper cup. “You can’t go with them, Abdiweli.”
“Wh-what?” I snap my head toward him, making sure I’m hearing him right.
He stares into his drink, like he’s looking for something in the dregs. “You’ve been with Al Shabaab too long. My superiors didn’t agree to it.”
Shock ripples through me. “But—but you’re the one who made me join the Boys in the first place!”
Jones finally looks at me, his jaw twitching. “I know. But we’re going to set up an apartment for you in Sangui City. Refugee status and everything. You can go to school there and—”
I get to my feet. “Fuck that! Fuck school and an apartment. You think that’s what I want? I don’t want to go to Kenya! I want my family!” All the fear and exhaustion and fury I’ve been keeping tightly bound comes roaring to the surface. “My brother might be dead by now because of you, and I’m not losing the rest of them! Whether you help me or not, I’m going there! I’ll find them.”
“After all this? You’ll only get them killed.”
I feel like he’s punched me in the gut. As I’m standing there speechless, a soldier pokes his head around the door. “Everything okay in here, sir?”
“Fine.” Jones waves him away.
I barely register the interruption. “How would I get them killed? They’re safe now!”
He cocks his head. “Are they? Think about it, Abdiweli. Al Shabaab—and the groups they work with—they have eyes and ears everywhere. In Europe, in America . . . That’s the interconnected world we live in. Believe me, I see all the chatter that goes back and forth over the Internet. Hits are ordered from Iraq and carried out in Germany within hours. Maybe Al Shabaab thinks you’re dead, but that won’t stop them from looking for you and your family. They’ll know you’re the reason the Doctor’s been taken from them. And they’ll find your family; there’s no doubt. Once they do, don’t you think there will be people keeping tabs on them, waiting to see if maybe you’re still alive? If maybe you show up in a month or two for a happy reunion?”
I feel my fury go cold, slink up around my throat like a rope being slowly tightened. The ringing in my ear reaches a high, needle-fine pitch.
“They’ll wait until you’re settled in and comfortable, and then they’ll strike,” Jones goes on. “I’ve seen it happen. They’ll get their revenge. Maybe they won’t even go for you. They’ll take out your mother, or your little sister. Something that will make you feel the pain they want you to feel. Something that will remind all their followers what happens to traitors.” He stops, waits for what he’s saying to finish echoing in my brain. Then he puts a hand on my shoulder. “Alone, they have a chance to blend in, disappear. But with you there, it would be a hundred times harder. Do you really want to take that risk?”
I shake him off. I hate him right now more than I’ve ever hated him.
Is what he’s saying true? Or does he just not want me in his country?
I back away, turn again to the window. If I’m going to cry, I’m not doing it in front of him.
“You did a good job, Abdiweli. Don’t forget that. You saved hundreds of people tonight. And your family. They’d be proud.”
I don’t turn around. I don’t shout the things I want to shout at him. That Bashir is dead. That if my brother survives his gunshot wound, he just might die anyway, because the Boys will most likely suspect him of helping me. I want to scream at him that all of this is his fault. That some of my family is safe now, but they were only ever in danger because Jones used them as part of his sick game.
I may never see them again.
“You’ll be taken by helicopter to Sangui in about fifteen minutes,” Jones says, standing up. “Be ready.”
I desperately want him to leave the room. I can feel my legs trembling, and it’s only a matter of time before they give out on me. I wait for him to go, but he lingers.
“Here,” he says finally, holding a business card out for me to take. It has a phone number on it, nothing else. “I know you’ll be fine in Sangui City, but just in case, this is my number. For emergencies only. Use the code word. We’re grateful for what you’ve done, Abdiweli. I want you to know that.” He waits. I don’t move. He clears his throat, like he wants to say something else.
I keep looking out the window.
He tucks the card in my front shirt pocket anyway. Then he sighs deeply, and walks out without another word.
FIFTY-FIVE
NOW: DECEMBER 15
SANGUI CITY, KENYA
“And so I came here, to Sangui,” I say, my voice flat, without a scrap of emotion. “A man took me to a hotel, said he’d be back in an hour to bring me to the apartment. I made sure I was gone by the time he got back.”
Sam’s car has gotten hot in the time it’s taken me to tell my story, even with the windows rolled down. But it’s not the heat that makes me feel lifeless.
I’ve told her everything, left nothing out. It all sounds sort of incredible—clandestine American military missions and microchips under your skin and secret tunnels—and even though I kept expecting her to, Sam never stopped me to ask if I’m full of shit. The whole time I was talking, in fact, she hardly said anything. She just let me talk. In a way, I sort of forgot she was even there. It was almost like after trying so hard to forget it all, I needed to tell myself what happened.
“And your family?” she finally asks, when it’s clear I’m done.
“Maybe they’re in Idaho. I don’t know.”
“Oh, Abdi . . .” She looks back out at the water. Her eyes are red at the edges. My own are dry. Permanent damage, I hear Muna echo in my mind.
I wait for Sam to say something, to tell me that it’s all going to be okay, or that what happened is part of God’s design, or some other totally useless lie that adults tell kids when bad shit happens. But after a while it’s clear that she isn’t going to say anything like that. Which is some small relief.
I remember what she said about how talking can help, how it can feel like letting go of a weight. I guess I get that, but instead of feeling lighter, now I just feel constricted, like someone’s looped a rope around my chest and pulled it as tight as it will go. I open my car door and walk to the seawall. Sam waits a second, then follows. After the hot car the wind is a mercy. We stand at the wall, casting long shadows out over the water. Waves hurl themselves against the rocks below us, shattering, re-forming. It reminds me of Bashir’s perch.
“So I guess I am a terrorist,” I say, smiling bitterly.
She turns fully toward me. “No,” she says, so forcefully that I startle. I can sort of see the word in my mind: N. O. Period. “You’re not a . . .” She sighs, as if the word itself frustrates her. She shakes her head. “The world is so messed up, Abdi, but you? You’re one of the good things in it.”
A sort of strangled noise comes out of my chest. “Sam, didn’t you hear me? I was with them! I did terrible things! I killed people! I was an Al Shabaab Boy.”
She shakes her head. “No, Abdi! That man, that horrible Mr. Jones—he made you join them. None of that was your fault!”
“How is killing people not my fault?” I demand. “I pulled the trigger, didn’t I?”
Her eyes are wide and for a second she looks desperate and wild, like she wants to reach out and shake me. “You did what you had to do! That was to save your friends, your brother.”
“I didn’t go back for Bashir! Or Dahir. I should have done something! They’re probably dead, and it’s my fault. I mean, I’m the reason Dahir joined Al Shabaab in the first place! They never would have kidnapped him if it wasn’t for me! All of this comes back to me; it’s my fault!”
A wrinkle passes over Sam’s face. “What—”
“Oh yeah, that’s the best part!” I hear my voice rising to a crazy pitch. I can’t make myself stop shaking. I’ve never talked about that day to anyone, not even my mother.
I can see it all, every second in high definition, like three years ago was yesterday. When the Boys burst into our school, I did what everyone was doing. I ran, without any thought but to get away. I ended up in the schoolyard, crouched behind the latrine with a couple of kids from my class.
The Boys were shouting, firing their guns in the air. Kids were screaming, teachers were begging. From my spot I saw Dahir run past and leap up the wall. I watched him get halfway over and then stop, look around. Run, I wanted to shout at him, Go! And then I realized he was looking for me and Hafsa. His eyes landed on me and for a second we just stared at each other. That’s when I should have yelled, told him to go. How many times have I seen him in my nightmares, just hanging there on the wall, between two worlds? On one side of the wall, freedom. On the other, death. He should have gone. But he didn’t. Because he saw what I didn’t.
He jumped back down and tackled the Boy who was headed straight for my hiding place.
It took about three seconds for the Boy to smash Dahir’s face into the dirt, get his hands behind his back and haul him up, off to the technical.
They took him away.
And I did nothing.
I just sat there and watched. Hidden, frozen.
“It should have been me,” I say, barely able to form words. “It should have been me Al Shabaab took in the first place. If they’d taken me, none of the other stuff ever would have happened. He saved me that day. And I—I just left him there in that hotel to die.”
“Abdi . . .” She puts a hand on my arm.
My whole body is trembling so hard that I feel like my joints are going to shake loose and I’ll just drop into a heap of parts. I pull my arm, but not hard enough to break away. It’s like I want her to be the one to let go. Can’t she see what I am? A coward who lets his brother and his friends die.
“You can’t keep punishing yourself. It was out of your control,” Sam says. She doesn’t let go.
“But I could have—”
“Listen to me,” she says, moving in front of me so I have to look at her. “You did the best you could. And I’m so sorry you had to go through this. I’m so sorry my government does fucked-up things like sending kids into terrorist cells to do their dirty work. I’m just—I’m sorry, Abdi. I . . .” She trails off. She tightens her grip. Her eyes are bright, reflecting the ocean. When she speaks, her voice is almost desperate. “I wish to God I could fix things. I wish there were some way to punish the people who hurt you and your family. But I can’t. All I can do is tell you the truth.” She waits until I look up at her, then says slowly and clearly, “You are a good person.”
“Sam, I—”
“You are good!” she repeats, her voice shaking with anger. “I don’t care what happened, what you did. You’re human, you did human things. We all do things we’re not proud of, but that doesn’t make us bad people. Not if we try to fix them. You tried, Abdi. You tried so hard. That’s what makes you good. We can’t always save everyone, as much as we want to, as hard as we try. But you can’t carry that guilt around with you forever. You just can’t. Your brother and your friend wouldn’t want that. They’d want you to live, and be happy. Do you hear what I’m saying?”
All I can hear are waves breaking on the seawall.
Sam is silent.
And then, without warning, all the tears I’ve been holding back since my brother was shot are pouring out of me, hot and fast. And I can’t speak. I can’t do anything but sob and hold my head in my hands and feel everything I’ve lost, feel it fresh all over again.
It’s like I’ve taken all my sadness and wrapped it up in a package inside of me because I don’t deserve to grieve. I should get to be sad only if I’m not to blame, right? But I can’t keep that package together anymore. The strings that bound it are fraying and snapping, and it’s all spilling out. I can’t even think about whether I’m good or not. All I know is that I’ve lost my family, my friend, and my brothers, and I heave great, gut-racking sobs, not caring anymore how I look or sound or who’s watching.
