Aug 11 Ten Steps from Nangarhar
Read by Ben Crystal
Yek.
The truck stops in the blackness. Saïd doesn't need light to see the driver jump from his cab, to hear hands brush against each other then rub against his thighs. A lighter flicks, the front door of the lorry closes and Saïd is left to count.
Do.
It started differently. In a truck, still, but with hope and clean clothes. Soraya was still glowing and ensconced in her new motherhood. She clutched Saiod to her breast and kept him tucked in to her jacket as the tyres hit bumps in the road. Saba and Sadaf looked from mother to father and back to each other, hidden in those private games that only twins can have with each other. A family of S-words, sad and scared and saturated with dreams of a better life. The five tickets to Turkey cost forty thousand pounds, money that Grandfather Sook had saved since before the Russians came. Saïd keeps his back straight, jaw set, and counts the countries, watches the borders as they fly past.
Se.
Turkey is the no man's land, the gap in the hour glass between one time and another. Behind them, Afghanistan carries on the same, as if their lifetime there had made no mark. Around them, Edirne rushes on, brokers offering them a guaranteed passage to Greece and all the jewels of lost Byzantium. In a dirty café, an old woman gives Saba a stuffed toy that looks like it has been with her since birth, and tells her to share nicely with her sister. It is a bear, maybe brown once, but grey now, and, tucked into the corner of Saba's mouth by its ear, it brings her a comfort. Too many days pass in limbo and money flows too quickly from his pockets.
Chaar.
Alone, he could take more chances, find a lorry, hide beneath its bed. With three others and a baby, there can't be any risk. He meets men in darkened bars where he can't see their faces and tries to negotiate. At home, he was strong, lethal in business. Here he is a scruffy traveller who has nothing to offer. A man with black eyes and stubble worse than Saïd's has grown promises to take them to Greece. After that, he says, they are on their own.
Panj.
In Athens it all unravels. Five of them, huddled together – not because they are cold , because they are scared – are pushed through registration. You stay here until they can send you back, a woman who is there with her husband tells them. Did you lose your papers? Their driver told them to long before they hit Turkey, and Saïd knew that all hope of doing this the right way was gone. At a rest stop, he buried them in the sandy road, a small burial for the five of them as they used to be. Everything will be new now.
There is never enough food in the camp. They call it the camp because detention is such a cruel word. For the children, camping can still be fun. Starving cannot. Rumours fly about men who have escaped. Some return with bruises the size of melons across their arms, their backs. Europe is not as kind as they dreamed.
Shish.
“You go.” Soraya whispers the words just as he is about to sleep. Saiod is tucked between them like a precious gem and Saïd watches as his eyes flicker as he sleeps.
“I don't want to.”
They don't speak of how it will work, of leaving each other. He says he will come back for them, that he will get papers and be legal and drive all the way across the stretch of Europe to bring them back. They don't talk about the camp, about how no-one manages to stay there very long. He cuts a long piece of Soraya's hair and curls it in to his wallet. It will keep you safe, she whispers, between kisses. They never say goodbye.
Haft.
He leaves in the rain, in the thunder. He hitches a lift to the city and tells the driver he is due to start work. The driver nods, and doesn't ask any questions. He is not friendly, not conspiratorial, but he is the closest thing to a friend that Saïd has found since Nangarhar.
Hasht.
The lorry stops for only a second. The business of Athens rushes around him but from where Saïd is standing he can see only the lorry, only the shadow of a chance. He runs through the traffic, praying that there will be few enough beeps of the horn that the driver of the lorry will keep looking forward, will not break the monotony of his attention. He reaches it in seconds and crouches down, and for a second he thinks of Chinese fighter films and pretends he is invincible. He slides, tucks his legs up and clutches on tight to something metal. He knows nothing about cars, and hopes that what he holds on to will bear his weight. He lifts his back up tight, the hiss of the wind passing between him and the road is loud and terrifying.
He closes his eyes.
Noh.
In France he meets a man called Yesat. They have been on the road together since Nangarhar without even knowing it, and Yesat remembers his wife and children. He asks what happened and Saïd fights the lump in his throat. Okay man, Yesat nods. We'll find a truck together, okay? Yesat knows the score here, and Saïd is content to follow.
In the middle of the night Yesat shakes him awake. Now. They try several doors before they find an open one and find the darkest corner of the lorry. Yesat's foot is through the door when the driver returns.
“Fucking Afghans,” he spits, his face reddening the closer he gets.
“When you get to the end, leave it ten minutes before you get out, then run.” Yesat hisses his advice before he runs away. The driver fat and breathless and too tired to chase him locks the door, and Saïd is lost to the darkness.
Dah.
He counts, and when he is sure ten minutes have passed he pushes the door. Open. Stupid English prick. He opens it as little as he needs and jumps down. His legs buckle as he hits the ground from a day cramped against crates. He crawls across the ground to a cluster of sharp bushes and looks out in the blackness. The car park is grey, a dullness set against a duller sky. He rubs the feeling back in to his legs and smiles. This is England.
--
Ten Steps from Nangarhar by Helen Dring was read by Ben Crystal at the Liars’ League East & West event on Tuesday August 9th, 2011 at The Phoenix, Cavendish Square, London.
Helen Dring lives in Liverpool with enough animals to make a small petting zoo and a mountain of books. She is studying for a MA in Novel Writing at Manchester Metropolitan University and is working on her first novel. Get in touch at [email protected].
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