A Brighter Fear (9 page)

I had no intention of going out the next day, no intention of seeing Steve, no intention of speaking to anyone but Hana and Aziz and the children, or staring at anything but the four walls that held me.

I volunteered to look after the boys, or to clean the house, or to do the washing, but it was all refused. Instead I was told to return again to the gas station, and my face fell as I realised it was impossible to hide from whatever was going on inside my head.

I took my sketchbook with me this time, deciding I would stop on the way, draw how we now had to live. And I ignored the danger around me, that I was being more than thoughtless for merely being out alone, and I really looked at, and really saw, what had become of my city.

I stepped around rubble, over holes in roads, dodged missing pavements and felt like I was walking on the surface of the moon. My pencil wasn’t used to drawing rubble, or buildings with only three walls left, or shops with no fronts. The architect in me wanted to sketch order and precision, purpose and beauty, because that’s what my country had.

Before.

While I tried to get these images on paper, I thought of who had done this, I thought of the insurgents and their IEDs and grenades, I thought of the soldiers and their bombs and guns. And I thought of Steve; an American, a soldier.

My feet crunched beneath me and I stopped. I glanced down: shards of glass, coloured glass, covering the tarmac, chunks of rubble, lumps of concrete around me. I looked up to where the church had been, that was now laying in pieces at my feet. Yet another space in the landscape, but not quite, just its bones remaining, stretching up into the sky. I could sketch what I could see, but couldn’t capture the feeling; incapable of showing how the stained glass on the ground used to sparkle into life when the sun hit it, and the rubble on the floor used to be walls that held together something special for so many.

And inevitably my feet led me to the gas station.

I sat down opposite, hidden in a corner, obscured from view, the overhang of a building providing a little shade. And I watched. And I sketched. A snapshot of my city, my home, what it had become.

How many cars were waiting, queuing to fill up? I could count seventy-two, but they faded into the distance, disappeared around a corner and the dust and their muted colours blended one into another, the end invisible and unknown. A few cars were topped with yellow taxi signs, and I wondered if Aziz was driving one of them.

What a simple thing this once was and what a difficult thing it had now become. I sketched the trucks, the cars, the vans, the lorries, but couldn’t get the emotion of the drivers, the fear that pulled down their mouths and wrinkled their brows. The knowledge of events that had passed here; car-jackings, stabbings, robberies, and no possibility of leaving quickly. Twelve hours to wait, maybe. Why should they be scared of filling their cars? Why should this be life-threatening? But now, here, in this city, just to live was life-threatening, wasn’t it?

The thought took me back to the soldiers.

I watched them.

They had all looked the same to me before, in their camouflage jackets and trousers, their heavy boots and dark glasses. Guns in their arms and pads on their knees, straps and cables and wires stretching around their chests.

But now, I saw Steve.

For a moment I stopped, watching him, thinking about him. And as I dodged across the road, I saw him look my way, saw him mutter something to his colleague before turning to me, his eyes on mine, a smile inside them. I tucked my sketchbook into my bag and poured him a drink.

“I didn’t think you’d come back again,” he said, taking a sip.

“Neither did I,” I whispered. I glanced to him, watching his fingers on the cup, his eyes darting over the cars in front of him, the people, the other soldiers. Then to me.

“I didn’t mean to upset you. It was a stupid idea, hell I shouldn’t’ve even thought it. But…”

I shook my head. “No, it… it was… nice. Just… unexpected.” I had surprised myself. By coming back, by wanting to see him, wanting to speak to him, spend time with him, by even thinking, to myself, that yes, I would like to go somewhere with him. Yes, take me somewhere away from here. Somewhere peaceful. But how could I say that?

Still I kept coming back to that same thing: what he was.

We stood in silence, next to each other, with each other, not touching, not looking, but ever so slightly too close. Nervousness or excitement or something that wasn’t fear for a change, prickled at my skin and leaped in my chest. What was I doing?

Nothing
, I told myself.
Nothing
.

Very slowly and very quietly he tilted his head towards me, flashing his bright blue eyes to mine. “But if you did change your mind,” he began, “then we could go somewhere, if you wanted, together.” He shrugged and I heard him swallow hard. “Not as a
date
, but as two people who get along and would like to spend some time together where there’s less of a chance of getting shot. Or blown up.”

I didn’t say a word.

“I don’t know where we’d go, or what we could do, but y’know, I could sort something out. I could get a couple of hours free.”

I lifted my head and looked at him. I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know what to do. I knew it was dangerous. I knew some people would think it reckless. Some would think I was a traitor. But for a moment, just a moment, I put all that aside and looked at the man standing before me.

And I nodded. “Yes,” I breathed.

“Yes?” he frowned.

“Let’s go somewhere, do something.” And I tried to smile, but caution and fear kept it hidden. Fear of what I was getting myself into, where this was going to lead, the danger I was putting myself in, and my family. I knew how senseless it was, not just agreeing to go somewhere with him, but the feeling I had for him, the emotion, the friendship, the attachment that was growing, it was all pointless.

But I couldn’t help it and I couldn’t stop it. And when I could find the courage not to listen to my fear, I would tell it I didn’t care.

For nearly a week I saw Steve every day and I began to feel a new freshness, something to look forward to when I went to bed at night, a reason to get up in the morning. Although still I was scared, of whatever it was between us.

My head questioned Steve’s motives for being so friendly, but it had been so long since I’d felt anything
but
anger and frustration and fear and loneliness that I tried to ignore that part of me. Instead I welcomed the feeling of warmth in my chest and how a smile felt to my face.

I would make chai in the morning, and take it down in a flask, making sure I offered it to other soldiers as well. But I would offer it to Steve last, and as he drank we would talk. And we talked about everything and anything; about the architecture of Iraq and American history, our favourite films and books, music we liked to listen to, places we longed to visit, rollercoasters and soggy popcorn, sweets you couldn’t buy any more and favourite toys that had long since broken.

And too often we would pause and find that we were standing too close to each other, or looking at each other for too long, or my laugh would be too loud, or I would reach out to touch him as you would touch your hand to a friend’s arm, and I would remember the danger I was in, and what people would think and say and do.

But still every day I walked to see him, and every day I waited for him to say that he had sorted something out, that he was taking me somewhere.

When I was walking to him and when I was with him, I didn’t care about the danger, but when I left, I felt eyes upon me, frowns glaring at me, and heard whispers of
gahob, whore,
of
feaky-feaky, sex
.

“Come and entertain us,” a different soldier shouted.

“How much?” another asked.

And I felt my face flush and wished I could hide it.

But I haven’t done anything wrong
, I kept thinking.
Why should I deny myself this small piece of happiness?
But still the echo of what Steve was bounced in my head; he was an American, he was a soldier; America bombed my country, destroyed my city, occupied my home. But, and there were so many buts, Saddam was gone, the man who took my mama from me, and so much had been promised for our futures: freedom, democracy, a better life.

By the end of our week, it felt as if we’d known each other for years, yet we had barely spoken for half an hour each day. I felt I was becoming myself again, felt my heart smile and my body lighten.

“Meet me tomorrow?” he said as I emptied out the dregs from the flask I was carrying.

I stopped and stared at him.

“I’ve got some time. Couple of hours in the afternoon,” he whispered. “Think I know where we can go.”

I didn’t reply.

“Meet me up there.” He nodded down the road. “Near the liquor store.”

Still I struggled for words. Thinking. Could I do this? Really? I shook my head. “No,” I said, my voice quavering, “not there, someone will see me.”

Another soldier walked past him, patting him on the back. “C’mon,” he said.

Steve looked at me. “Lina, I’ve got to go.”

“Come to the house,” I muttered. “But wait for me a little way up.” I tore some paper from my sketchbook and scribbled my address on it. “Don’t come to the door,” I pleaded, shaking my head.

“C’mon Steve!” someone else yelled.

“OK,” he nodded. And he took the paper from me and I watched him tuck it into his pocket. “Tomorrow,” he said. “About three.”

He turned and I watched him go. Watched him laugh with his colleagues, watched him climb into the truck, waited for him to look back, caught his eye when he did.

Questions pounded in my head as I walked home:
What was I doing? What would people think of me? What would Papa think? What would Layla think?
But I couldn’t answer myself, because I tried to convince myself it was irrelevant. Because nothing was happening. Because nothing was going to happen.

But I knew that was a lie, because something was happening, very slowly, very subtly, yet never spoken of or acknowledged.

And as I walked, I didn’t see the rubbish piled at the side of the roads, didn’t see the shops and schools that were falling down, didn’t hear the moan of the generators, the crackle of gunfire two streets away, or feel the heat beating down on me and the dust swirling around me.

Because the hope of what tomorrow could bring had obscured the fear living in my head. If only briefly.

I kept it all from Hana, not purposefully, but it never arose in conversation; that I happened to see the same soldier every day, that we talked, that we were becoming friends, that we were going somewhere together. Not a date, of course, although I could think of no other word to give it. A meeting? An outing? In my eyes, we were just friends going out together. Weren’t we?

But in the dark of the night, my worries came back. I laid in my bed, my eyes reaching through the blackness for something to rest on, but there was no light or shade. It was as if I had fallen into a hole; I could see nothing. And I thought of those stories, stories of what happened to girls who associated with the occupiers, girls who just spoke to them, or gave a smile. Only a smile. And stories of girls selling sex to the Americans, then killed by their own families; other families forcing daughters into it, desperate for money to survive.

I heard of these girls shot, their houses burned to the ground, their families forced to leave. I knew they weren’t gossip and I had added to the danger I was in, and my family, just by talking to Steve. I had made it personal.

And I thought what they would say to me, what they would do, whoever they were, these people who would know about Steve, who would know how I felt about him better than I did. I wouldn’t hear their car pull up outside, their footsteps heading to my house, or their hands bang open the door. I wouldn’t see their arms raise their guns or the barrel pointing at me. And I wouldn’t hear the bang, I would only see the flash.

And inside me my fear grew brighter.

I sat upright in bed, my chest tight, my throat dry, fear tearing through me, my stomach turning over and over.
What had I done?

I pulled the covers around me, longing for comfort that no one could give, feeling sick at my own naivety and my own selfishness.
What had I been thinking? Giving him my address? Asking him to pick me up here?

I was dismayed at my own stupidity, imagining the disbelief on Hana and Aziz’s faces if I told them what I had done, what I was planning to do. The risks spiralled in my head, the dangers, the threats. I thought about Mama, taken for doing nothing wrong; I thought about Papa, killed for doing his job; and I thought about the hundreds, thousands of innocent people killed so senselessly in this war.

And what had I done? Put myself in more danger. And Hana. And Aziz. And the boys.

I wouldn’t go, I vowed.

I would meet him, and would tell him I couldn’t go.

Tell him I couldn’t see him any more.

I told Hana I felt ill. It wasn’t a lie; my head pounded, my body ached, waves of nausea washed over me, and tiredness clung and dragged at me. I wanted to curl up and hide away from what I knew I had to say to Steve.

Because I didn’t want to.

I felt stuck. I felt helpless.

I stayed at home, watching the clock that seemed to have slipped into slow motion. I went back to bed for a while, but couldn’t sleep. I stared out of the window, depressed by what my city and my life had become, despairing of what future any of us could possibly have.

I felt angry. I felt frustrated.

I had to say no to Steve. I had to stop seeing him, stop talking to him.

At ten to three I peered out of the window, staring down the street, but saw nobody. I tried not to pace or fidget, tried to keep my nerves hidden and not keep glancing at the clock.

It was three o’clock when I opened the door and wandered outside. I moved slowly, trying to appear casual. I stood near the gate, my eyes searching down the road.
How would he get here?
I wondered.
What would he be wearing? Not his combat uniform, surely?

I waited, playing over in my head what I was going to say to him. Ignoring the doubt in the back of my mind, ignoring the fact that I
did
want to go with him, listening only to the part of me that was being practical, that
knew
it was too dangerous. The part of me that was reigned so totally by fear.

And I waited.

I went back in the house and out again, telling Hana I needed the fresh air, ignoring her comments about fumes and smoke, explosions and bullets. I kept my eyes low, wanting to wait, wait, and then to look up and see him there, walking towards me, smiling, welcoming, wanting to see me, to be with me. Somebody who was interested in me.

But again I looked down the road, and again he wasn’t there.

It’s only twenty past three,
I told myself,
he’s only late
. I felt so confused. What did I want? To see him? Yes, of course. Even if it was only to tell him I could never see him again, I wanted that one last time, a chance to explain, to say goodbye. I didn’t want to, but I knew I had to.

And I waited.

And waited.

And with every minute that passed, I felt hope drain from me. A thousand thoughts and worries spiralled in my head. What if he’d forgotten? Lost the paper? Changed his mind? What if it was all a joke? What if he’d been killed? Blown up? Shot?

My anger grew. So much had been taken from me. So much denied. First university and now Steve. Anything that offered even the smallest glimpse of hope, the smallest hint of happiness was deemed too dangerous. I had nothing, and at that very moment, I hated everything. I felt hopeless and irrelevant, useless and pathetic. And there was nothing I could do.

If only I could go back to uni
, I thought.
If only Hana would let me. Then I might have a hope at the future I want, not one she wants. I want to be independent, I want to be strong.

I turned around, marching back in the house, heading for Hana, desperate to do something, to vent the anger inside me, direct it at someone who I felt deserved it.

“I want to go back to university,” I announced.

She flicked me a look. “It’s too dangerous,” she said, her hands still busy scrubbing the kitchen. “You know that. There are still bombs everywhere, shootings everywhere, teachers and lecturers killed, students threatened. You want to die?”

“But you let me go out to the soldiers,” I replied.

She sighed. “That’s different.”

“Why?” I asked.

She was silent.

“Why?” I shouted.

She stopped cleaning, rubbed her hands on a towel and moved towards me. “Because you’re bringing money home,” she spat. “You’re earning your keep. Giving something back to us for looking after you. And maybe you’ll meet someone you could marry. Take you away from here.”

“You’re trying to get rid of me?”

She shook her head at me. “Wake up to yourself, Lina. And take a look around you. Look at life here. What’s important? An education? I don’t think so. I care about you, Lina, and that’s why I want to see you find someone who can look after you. Forget about university. Forget about a career. It wouldn’t do you any good. It would just put you in more danger. Think about finding yourself a suitor.”

I was confused, disbelieving and so, so angry. Her reasoning didn’t make sense, and she knew it didn’t. It was a lie. A lie because she didn’t want to admit the truth even to herself. But I knew deep down why. It was Mama, all over again. Why had she been taken? Because she was educated, Hana thought, because she was clever. She didn’t hide away under the protection of some man, washing pots and clothes and cooking food and bringing up babies. She had a choice. And that was all I wanted.

I couldn’t follow Hana’s reasoning. I didn’t understand. Would Mama have been taken if she hadn’t been a lawyer? Maybe not. Would Papa have been shot if he hadn’t been an interpreter? Maybe not. But wasn’t it more complicated than that? This war didn’t follow rules. Anyone could be killed. For so many different reasons.

I wanted to scream at her, that I wasn’t going to go missing like Mama, or if I did, it would be because I ran away from her. I was sick of doing as I was told, being polite, holding my tongue.

“How would you support yourself and the kids if Aziz wasn’t here?” I hissed at her. “What if he was killed? What would you do? What if he crashed his taxi and couldn’t drive any more? How would you feed the boys? Or a roadside bomb? What if he was dead? What if you were alone?”

She slapped me.

And I think I deserved it.

My face was hot. I was angry and humiliated, but I stood my ground, I wouldn’t let her see what I was feeling.

“You’re useless without him,” I whispered.

I stormed from the room with tears in my eyes. And I opened the door and marched outside, the air fresh but hot, clammy on my skin.

I paced up and down, my face stinging, my chest burning, my heart thumping with rage and embarrassment. My argument with Hana had only made things worse. It had been pointless. Now there was no Steve here to make me feel better, and again there was no prospect of university. What had I been hoping for?

I looked across the city; the electricity was down again and houses hummed with the sound of generators. It drowned out my heavy breathing and my sobs. I was shocked at myself. I had never spoken to anyone like that. I felt ashamed, yet I felt relieved. I had finally said what I thought, but now wished I could take it back to save her feelings.

I felt selfish for wanting a life. I felt guilty for not being happy. I felt ungrateful for wanting more than just being alive, when so many had been killed. I was starting to hate the sound of my own moaning in my head. I needed to do something, to change the balance and to act.

Cars rumbled in the distance and in the streets around me. My pacing slowed and I stared up at the cloudless sky, the palest blue. I felt a moment’s peace. Then gunfire. But now I didn’t flinch. I closed my eyes, listening to the sound tear through the skies, and I knew it was coming from the east. Then I heard an explosion perhaps a mile away, screams, shouts, alarms, and I opened my eyes to see smoke lift into the air, a grey stain, growing and stretching into the sky, reminding me that I was still in Baghdad, still in a war zone.

Away in the distance I could see a US humvee and I froze. I stared at it, watching it, waiting for it to disappear, praying it wouldn’t head towards me, it wouldn’t stop. I knew we hadn’t done anything wrong, but I knew that didn’t matter. Somebody, anybody, could’ve nodded in our direction, for any reason, or without reason. The soldiers had the power. They could do as they pleased.

But it drove in a different direction, and as I let out the longest sigh of relief, I turned away and saw a motorbike, stopped near the end of the garden, the engine off. A man was sitting on it, a dusty jacket around him, a scarf pulled around his face, sunglasses blocking his eyes, a gun slung across his back.

His body turned around to me as if in slow motion.

I backed up, watching him, trying to think how far away I was from the house. He stretched an arm towards me, beckoning me closer, and I thought I saw his other hand move to his gun. I sucked in a breath ready to scream, but fear gripped my throat. All the horror stories I had heard, about soldiers, insurgents, militia, terrorists, flew through my head.

I forgot about my friendship with Steve.

Instead my mind and my fear showed me men, armed men, ramming into homes of Iraqis, guns pointing everywhere, at everyone; it showed me an American soldier dragging a woman into the street in her nightwear, shame dripping off her as she cried, desperate to cover herself up; it showed me a man in prison, his arms tied behind him, a lead around his neck, pulled around the room like a dog; it showed me a young woman, lying on the floor, her face bloodied, a man fastening his trousers.

Horror stories spread like wild fire. Good ones did not.

I stumbled backwards, knocking over a metal bucket, it clattered to the ground. I couldn’t breathe and I felt my eyes burn with fear. Was this it? Was this my time? Was this as far as I would go? The man stared at me. I waited to become the next horror story.

“Lina,” he said. “Lina, it’s me.”

And I breathed.

I dared to think, to believe.

The door behind me opened and Aziz stood framed by it. “What are you doing, Lina? Was that you?” he questioned.

I turned to look at him, waiting for his anger to explode because of what I had said to his wife, or for him to see the man on the bike, to question who he was, what he was doing, to think the worst, while I was hoping the best. “I was just getting some air, Uncle, I didn’t see the bucket, I knocked it over. I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

He waved his hand around in the air. “All right, child,” he replied. “Stay in the garden, keep safe. And no more buckets. You’ll have the neighbours thinking we’re being raided.” He went back into the house.

I waited until the door was closed and dared to edge towards the motorbike, dared to believe that it was who I hoped it was. The man lifted off his glasses, pulled down his scarf and I saw him, I saw Steve.

“What are you doing here?” I asked.

“Lina, I’m sorry I’m late, things got difficult.” He shook his head.

I tried to stop myself crying, tried so hard to hold back the sobs. I didn’t want him to see me like that, to see me as weak, as someone he had to save or protect. But the tears burst from me. Was this someone who actually cared, who was showing me that he cared? He stepped forward, a hand raised in compassion, his rough fingers brushing the hair from my face, tucking it behind my ear.

My very being screamed at me to step back. My conscience shouted at me. What was I doing? What was I letting happen? Hadn’t I said no to this? This friendship with the occupiers?

“Come with me,” he whispered.

I stared at him. Hadn’t I made my decision? Didn’t I know what I was going to say to him?

“Come with me,” he repeated.

I glanced to the motorbike. “On that?”

He nodded and smiled, his face lifting me and warming me.

“I can’t,” I replied. But I didn’t mean the words.

“Just for a couple of hours.”

“But…” I searched for excuses. “What about… what will I tell them? Aziz and Hana?”

He shrugged. “You’re at a neighbour’s house. Playing with their children, perhaps. Or you’re out selling chai. Anything.”

I looked at him and I didn’t care about the consequences any more. I had lived by the rules and watched my life fall apart around me. What had I done that had caused Mama to be taken and Papa to be killed? Now I was going to do something, I was going to give reason for my own demise, when before, reason seemed unnecessary.

I felt a smile spread across my face.