After they find it, they will kill me, you think. You just hope that they do it quickly, and somewhere private. Not in front of Jok, Adut or – Allah help her – Jamilah.
‘Yes!’ cries a second voice, and you feel the pen slide from your pocket like a dagger. ‘Here it is!’
With the hand still over your mouth, your lungs are burning and you can’t speak. If you could, though, you wouldn’t use your breath to plead for mercy – you’ve seen enough of al-Shabaab to know that would be a waste. Instead, you’d use it to speak to Allah.
I’ve been faithful, you’d say. Weigh my heart, look at it. See if the light shines through it. If you can’t give me any more time on earth, then please, take me to be with my aunty again.
You can’t say the words, but you think them, and you wonder if something beyond the desert sky hears you.
Then dawn breaks, a single shot fires and, like an eagle flying over the Nile and out to sea, you are gone.
To return to your last choice and try again, go to scene 23.
You shake your head, and back away. You won’t climb into a truck full of the very people you’re running from.
The driver shrugs, revs his engine and roars off in a cloud of dust. You’re lucky he didn’t take the gun from you by force, or kill you both on the spot for not giving it to him. He must have had bigger fish to fry today.
You look back at the shelter with the woman’s bones. You know with grim certainty that if you lie down in there again, you’ll never get up. You’ll have to stay beside the road, walk a little further if you can, and pray for another vehicle to pass soon.
You stagger onwards. Jamilah’s lighter to carry than a girl her age should be, but she still feels too heavy for you to carry. You place one foot in front of the other, willing yourself on. Just a little further, just… a little…
Your knees collapse under you, and Jamilah’s weight knocks you to the ground. You manage to roll her off you, then, by propping the gun upright in the sand and draping your two tattered blankets over it, you make a tiny hot triangle of shade.
Your eyes slide closed, and you feel yourself rippling like a heat haze, dissolving into the ever after. Your body, entwined with Jamilah’s, lies unmoving, to be slowly buried by the weather, shipwrecked on a sandy sea.
To return to your last choice and try again, go to scene 24.
You nod your agreement. The driver holds out his arm, and you hand the gun to him through the ute’s window.
Then you limp around to the back and pass Jamilah up to the soldiers sitting on two benches lining the sides of the ute’s open tray, their knees meeting in the centre. By shifting their feet, they make space for you both on the floor.
Jamilah remains unconscious, lying at the soldiers’ feet, and you sit behind her, your knees up and your arms folded tight around them. The ute revs forward along the sandy road. You push one of your blankets under Jamilah’s head to keep it from banging against the floor of the truck and the soldier’s boots.
At first, you don’t speak to the soldiers. You merely watch them, and remain on your guard. But when one of them takes a sip from a water bottle, he looks down sideways at you and sees the thirst on your face.
‘Here, have some,’ he says, pushing the bottle towards you.
You eye him warily, but you can’t refuse. You’re about to raise the bottle to your mouth when you think of Jamilah.
‘Can you help me hold my sister’s head up while I tip a little water in?’ you ask.
The soldier nods. He reaches down, scoops up Jamilah’s head, and gently pushes on her jaw to open her mouth. The water you tip from the bottle trickles out the sides of her mouth and onto her clothes, but you think she might have swallowed a bit.
‘Keep giving it to her,’ says the soldier. ‘Little sips at a time. And have some yourself too. I don’t need it back. We’ll be in Nairobi by lunchtime.’
‘Thank you’ isn’t big enough to convey the gratitude you feel.
The soldier, who introduces himself as Hassan, keeps helping you to give Jamilah water. She’s still not conscious, but she’s swallowing better, and you know that with some water inside her she has a much greater chance at hanging on to life.
The trip is mostly silent, until, after a few more hours, Hassan asks you: ‘So, why are you going to Nairobi?’
All eyes suddenly fall on you. You don’t expect that Hassan’s kindness will continue if you reveal that you’re wanted by al-Shabaab.
‘My uncle might be able to get me a job there,’ you lie. ‘Loading trucks.’
Hassan nods. ‘Lucky you. An uncle, and a job – that’s more than most have.’
‘I guess so.’ You shrug. ‘But we nearly didn’t make it.’
Hassan smiles, but it’s a sad smile. ‘We all have our fates,’ he says quietly. ‘Yours must have been to live. Allah will decide ours soon enough. Hopefully he’ll take mercy on a group of orphans.’
Orphans? You look around at the other boys in the back of the ute. Some of them are glaring at Hassan, as though he’s said too much. Others share his sad, resigned smile.
‘We’re orphans too,’ you tell them, hoping to gain their trust.
‘Then you were lucky to escape Bright Dream,’ whispers Hassan.
Your heart leaps at that name, but the boy-soldier next to Hassan immediately snaps, ‘Shut up! Don’t talk about it!’
‘I will if I want to,’ persists Hassan. ‘After all, you have to tell the truth before you die if you want
