Then Yasir shouts, ‘Teacher!’ and they all leap up and scatter, leaving you alone in the dust.
You sit up and take juddering breaths until you can breathe easily again. You managed to grab most of the coins, but you’re about a hundred shillings down now – a third of all your and Jamilah’s hard work. You put your hand to your face and feel a puffy warm lump around one eye.
Jamilah looks scared when you get home and she takes in the sight of you. You fill her in on what happened in a dull voice. Then you lie down and close your eyes, your mess of disappointment and anger fading into a bone-heavy tiredness, and you don’t wake again until after dark.
When you wake, the first thing you see is Jamilah’s small shoulders under her blanket next to you. She hears you stir and sits up.
‘Are you okay?’ she asks in a little voice.
‘I feel fine,’ you lie. ‘What about you? It’s late, did you eat dinner?’
‘I had it at Aunty’s,’ she replies. Jamilah has found a friend – a Somali woman who lives several tents down from yours, who Jamilah calls Aunty. Aunty’s children died in the famine, and she seems very attached to Jamilah. She sings her songs and gives her little treats, like a pencil for school, a piece of dried fruit, or a shiny bangle. Jamilah adores her.
‘Okay then,’ you say. You lie back down and think about the fact that your shirt is now crusty with dirt. It’s your only one. You will have to miss a morning of school tomorrow to try to wash it properly with the little water you have in your tent.
You manage to make it to school by the next afternoon, in a clean-ish shirt. You take a seat on the other side of the room from the boys, and you ignore each other. After school, you rush out to avoid them, going straight to Jok’s hut and making a start on working through the long list of people waiting for one of your bottle-lamps.
When you get back to your tent around dinnertime, Jamilah isn’t there. She must be at Aunty’s. You walk down to get her.
Sure enough, there’s Aunty, braiding Jamilah’s hair and singing a soothing song. Jamilah looks worried. Her little brow is furrowed, and she’s twisting her fingers around her skirt. There are thin lines of dried-up tears on her cheeks.
‘What’s wrong?’ you ask.
She doesn’t reply. Aunty does. ‘Tsk, you should have been home this afternoon. Poor little Jamilah needed you.’
‘Why? What happened?’ you ask, your heart rising into your throat.
Please be okay, you think. Please be okay. The camp is not a safe place, especially for young women and girls.
‘Two men came to our tent,’ whispers Jamilah.
‘It’s all right, they didn’t attack her,’ says Aunty. ‘They frightened her, though.’
‘They said they knew I was Rahama Daahir’s niece,’ she says. ‘They asked where you were.’
Al-Shabaab. The secret you let slip during your fight with the boys has spread fast. You feel sick to the stomach. Then a thought strikes you.
‘The pen! Where is it, Jamilah?’
‘It’s all right,’ says Aunty again, still braiding Jamilah’s hair. ‘After the men left, she brought it straight to me. It’s lovely – is it real gold?’
‘Oh, no,’ you lie. ‘Definitely not.’ You don’t want Aunty to think it’s worth anything.
‘Still, it’s very nice – amazing you’ve kept it all this while. Jamilah asked me to keep it safe. Something to do with … Arsenal?’
The reference to al-Shabaab makes your stomach drop. ‘Um,’ you say. You don’t know Aunty very well, and you don’t know what to do. If you could trust her with the truth, it would be good to hide the pen with her – al-Shabaab won’t think to look for it here. But what’s to say she won’t just steal the pen and sell it, or even worse, betray you to al-Shabaab? You notice that Jamilah is hugging one of Aunty’s skinny, dry legs as Aunty continues to braid her hair.
Aunty looks up at you.
‘Well?’ she asks.
If you admit the truth and ask Aunty to help you keep the pen safe from al-Shabaab, go to scene 20.
If you take the pen back and lie about its origins, go to scene 21.
Jamilah loves Aunty so much, you reason to yourself. And Aunty thinks of her like her own child. She wouldn’t betray us.
So you tell her everything.
Aunty’s eyes grow wide as she listens. She nods, and says supportive things like, ‘Wow! You poor children,’ and, ‘So what happened next?’
You find that it’s an immense relief to be able to tell another adult your story – someone who really wants to listen; who comes from your country and truly understands what it’s like there. She’s the first person you’ve told since you came to Dadaab; you haven’t even told Jok.
‘I hate Arsenal, I really do,’ Aunty says when you’re finished. ‘Anything I can do to weaken them would be an honour.’
You feel strange to leave the pen in her care, but you can have it back anytime you want it, and this way if the al-Shabaab guys come looking for you again, they won’t find anything.
Now you just have to hide yourselves. But where? After all, Dadaab is a place for people who have run out of other places to escape to.
‘You can stay here with me tonight,’ offers Aunty.
‘Thank you so much,’ you say. ‘But we should move to a different part of the camp – further away from here.’
‘We could go to Scavenger Jok’s,’ says Jamilah.
You don’t want to bring trouble to Jok and Adut’s home, but you can’t think of a better idea.
Jok and Adut are stricken with worry when they hear your story. Jok has tears in his eyes, and Jamilah starts crying too. It’s as if
