She should ask the Hoopoe for advice. But he just kept telling stories. One after the other, as if all the answers were inside the narrative, all the guidance embedded in the logic. Besides, she was fairly occupied here, engaged in her surroundings. She did not want to tackle the future. The loch staved off the problem of her homelessness and she was young enough to inhabit the present. The attic room was the best of homes; Salma and Moni her family.
It was a long walk to the other side of the monastery. Surely the boy didn’t live that far, otherwise Moni wouldn’t have found him playing near their cottage. It didn’t make sense. But Iman did not abort her mission. She would look for the boy and his family today, as best as she could. She heard scratching and panting behind her, but before she could turn to look, a force pushed her to the ground. She started to yell and kicked at the large dog. This made it more aggressive and she gasped as the gravel cut into her palms, the weight of the dog crushing her chest and thighs. The grass rose up to claim her and, for the smallest increment in time, it felt as if she was being sucked into a warm smoky place. The ground, hard as ever but still capable of becoming concave, hollowed, as if it were a belly sucked in. She started to hyperventilate and, lifting her head, saw a bright red spot of blood on her palm. Even here. Even here, there could be fighters, snipers, violence. They surrounded her now, slipping the leash over the dog’s head and pulling it back. The concerned owners talking and talking, to the barking, leaping dog and to her all at once. They apologised, was she seriously hurt? Their dog was new and friendly, his energy still unbalanced, and she was small. ‘You shouldn’t have fought him off,’ the woman chided. ‘You made him more excited.’
Iman pushed herself up and dusted her clothes. The Alsatian frisked around her. The sounds it made, its saliva, fur and smell – all were incomprehensible. Iman wanted to get away from these people who were too watchful, too talkative, too close. Her tongue betrayed her. She answered them in a language they didn’t understand. She couldn’t help it. The English words were out of reach, she knew them but could not retrieve them. They had slipped away, unreliable.
Her heart beat, ya Allah, ya Allah – forming proper words, while her tongue could only mumble.
‘Let me see your hands,’ the man said. Iman hid her hands behind her back. She did not want them to nurse her, to flutter over her.
‘Go away, leave me alone,’ she said, and it was a good thing that she could not be rude in English.
She hobbled back to the cottage, where Moni and Salma fussed over her. She lay on the sofa and cried out that her body hurt, all her bones were broken and, for sure, she must be dying. Alarmed, the other two surrounded her, examining and questioning. She had bruised her knees and cut her palms, but it was her mind that was more troubled. All the bad dreams that had belonged to dark nights flared up, brought to life by the sudden fright and physical pain. She saw, again, fresh blood spilt, whiteness that wasn’t porridge but brain; she smelt charred flesh and heard children screaming. She hadn’t escaped. In this idyllic location the war could come and not from the internet or the television screen. It could rise from inside her because she had not left it behind. She had brought it with her on the airplane.
And the earth had wanted her, had tried to hug her in, to cradle her. ‘I was going to be buried alive!’
‘You must have imagined it,’ said Salma. She noticed that Iman was dressed as Jessie and, for all her bravery, she was terrified of dark enclosed places. ‘We will go back to the very same spot where you fell, and you will see that the ground is flat and normal.’
Of course, it did not make sense. The earth was not like the wall of a stomach, capable of clenching. But the earth could contract, could it not? If Iman had been better educated she would have known. Or at least known how to find the information. Fear and muddled thoughts. ‘Mummy, mummy,’ she wailed. ‘I want my mummy.’
Moni could no longer help it. She turned away from the scene on the sofa, struggling to hide her amusement. Salma, though, was visibly moved. ‘My darling, you are fine, you are fine.’ She fetched a pocket mirror and Iman examined her face with care. No scratch or blemish on the beautiful cheeks, that bluish black smudge on the chin certainly dirt and not a bruise.
Iman eventually settled down, her moans subsiding, her anguish blending into peevish requests. She became a queen reclining, with two ladies-in-waiting fetching and carrying for her. Moni was dispatched to the kitchen to make soup. Salma bustled with ice pack, hot-water bottle and paracetamol. Cups of tea. Iman sighed, and tears rolled down her cheeks. For a couple of hours, Salma and Moni sat on the floor next to her couch.
‘No one
