Bridge 108

by Anne Charnock

  I’m thinking about that as I walk back to the yard. See, it don’t seem right somehow, not that I’m going feeble in my middle age. These migrants do their indentures and then they’re set up to fail. One noisy birthday party and they’re dragged in for disturbing the peace. I’d be doing them a favour if I took them under my protection, clan protection. I’ll find out where they’re being housed, get some recruiters in there. They’ll be legal, after all, but they’ll need shielding from trumped-up charges. They’ll be scared shitless of putting a foot wrong. With clan connections, the police will stay away.

  I’ll catch the sunrise. Call me romantic.

  Five hours’ sleep is enough for me but, still, sleeping on that lumpy sofa in my office was a bad idea. I should have gone home because I’m aching like I’ve done a week on the conveyors. I’ll walk off the aches and stiffness. Same time, I’ll think about the day ahead. Whenever I have a problem nagging at me, this is the time of day I get it straightened out.

  I make my way in the dark to the eastern edge of the enclave. It’s not far away because the recycling yard is on the eastern outskirts—that means the smells are blown away from the enclave most of the time. It’s dead quiet. The first noise of the day will be the bicycle trailers—ours and the other clans’—taking waste to the incinerator plant, but they don’t start their back-and-forth until five o’clock.

  I’ll watch the sunrise then slip back home before the kids wake up, close the door quietly, ease off my shoes and get back in bed. I like it when Yana groans that I’m cold and tries to push me off. But she’s so warm, it feels like coming home. Morning sex is the best because I’m too brain fried at the end of the day. Mornings are the only time I feel chilled enough. Sometimes I’m so sick of the pressure, looking out for the whole family. But it’s best to be the boss. That’s what I keep telling myself, and Yana understands how I feel about the mornings.

  I should walk out here more often, and this early. Clears my fucken grey matter. An old heap of a car lies abandoned by the side of the track, and I sit on the bonnet waiting for the sun to lift fully above the horizon. Shouldn’t take long. There’s enough light to make a silhouette of the giant incinerator, the warehouse at the fish farm and the perimeter walls around the whole camp. I wouldn’t ever admit it to anyone, but if I had to choose a labouring job, I’d fancy working on a fish farm. Working beside water appeals to me. Must feel cool even at the height of summer. Better than the dusty heat in our yard. And the fish must be happy enough, until the moment they’re sucked out and put on ice. Even then they won’t know what’s going on.

  I’ve heard it said that you can tell when someone works at the fish farms, not just by the smell but by the state of their nails. You get strong and shining nails as if they’re morphing into fish scales. Don’t believe that myself. I look down at my own nails. Would people think it strange, like . . . affective, if I kept them clean? I’ve been thinking about my image, how I need a thing. Then people would say, you know Jaspar? The guy with . . . the thing?

  If I’d been chipped, I’d know what my thing should be. Tried to come up with something by scanning through images of clan bosses and old-world gangsters, looking for their thing. But it’s too hot for most of their trademarks—the clothes, the hats. Clean fingernails though . . .

  The sun’s sitting on the horizon, and the sky’s lightening up. I catch a movement across the ground about thirty metres away. A stray dog probably. I use my heel to dig out a stone in the earth. I pick it up and lob it at the dog shape. I miss the fucker. It moved so fast I reckon it must be a cat, a big un.

  I reckon I’ll call on Lex this morning and have a chat about a new sewing machine. Whenever I do make a gesture, like if I do buy Lex a machine, I prefer to go over the top. It’s my way. You could say that’s my thing. I’ll surprise Lex by offering more than she asks for, buy a brand-new machine instead of a second-hand one. I’ll ask her what else will increase her productivity, or I might even ask if she wants the bigger flat across the landing. I could sort that out, easy. She did mess up with them kids, but Amber says I should go easier on Lex because she’s her one close friend. Amber doesn’t like to mix too much outside the family, and she doesn’t want Lex to leave the enclave, to go back home. And seeing Lex, Amber says, helps her to remember Ruben, and remember how happy Ruben was with Lex.

  There’s a metallic creaking noise somewhere behind me, and I recognise it straight off. I try to ignore it, but it’s getting closer until it’s like a squeaking rat, disturbing my private time, my thinking time. Comes closer still, until a guy pedalling a rubbish trailer appears directly alongside me.

  I say, “What the fuck you doing out at this time?”

  I don’t recognise the runt. He’s not one of ours. We never send our trailers out this early.

  He looks over his shoulder at me and says something foreign. He’s not wishing me good morning, that’s clear. Ruddy cheek. So I shout, “Speak fucken English.”

  He stops, swivels on his seat and shouts back, “I speak good English. Go fuck yourself.”

  He starts cycling, standing on each pedal in turn, grunting with the effort. I stride towards him. He’s all unawares of the payback coming his way. I throw a punch at the side of his face and he buckles. Bet he regrets stopping now. I drag him to the ground. He scrambles on all fours, but I take one, two, three long strides and stamp down on his rib cage. Flatten him. I lean over, grab his top with both hands, pull him over so I can see his face, and land a punch, and another, and another, and carry on until he isn’t resisting. He just takes it. He’s moaning real quiet, and I stroll over to the trailer, nice and easy, take a closer look. I grab a handful of food waste, go back to the pathetic heap on the ground, prise open his mouth and shove the stuff in. He retches but I force him facedown into the ground, sit on his back, and wait for him to go still. All the while, I’m rehearsing a pep talk for our own migrant workers about showing respect to their betters.

  I don’t slip back into bed with Yana. I take a shower and sit up waiting for everyone to wake. The kids have their breakfast and take themselves off to school after giving me baby bear hugs. As soon as they’re out the door, I ask Yana to give me a manicure. Jeez, does she look surprised. I don’t smile, so she knows I’m dead serious, and I tell her that I want my nails cleaned and polished up real bright, like fucken fish scales.

  PART 3

  FOUR YEARS LATER

  CHAPTER 8

  CALEB

  It’s a gamble, but it’s worth the risk if I reach the fish tanks before anyone else. Sprinting from the dormitory when I’m half-asleep, the night alert still ringing in my ears, I could trip on the cracked ground again. The scabs have only just dropped off from my last fall on the concrete yard. Pink patches on my knees and elbows. Not a good look. Last week broke the record—the alarm rang five nights in a row. Truth is, we need a new technician. Holden takes no pride in his work.

  Father’s voice pops into my head: “You might as well do a job properly, Caleb, as do it badly.” I don’t argue with that, not now, but back then I’d have sulked. I can remember his voice, his words. I can’t see his face, but I don’t really want to. I swear, he never knew hard work in his life. Not like I fucken know it.

  I take a shortcut across the warehouse loading bays. The concrete is badly broken up where the transporters swing around and reverse up. Twice a week we load the transporters with boxes packed with tilapia and ice. We’ll be a few boxes short for the deliveries on Saturday if we can’t sort out tonight’s emergency. I feel bad when there’s a cock-up because, when production drops, it’s the city wholesalers who come first. The enclave, just a kilometre away, always loses out.

  Not that I’ve been to the enclave. But from the top of the dormitory block, I’ve seen the edge of the enclave with its workshops and the housing blocks beyond. Easy to imagine it’s W3 if I ignore the surrounding woodlands of the Mersey Forest. Probably, this camp is fifty or more kilometres from W3. Maybe a hundred. I’m
stupid, really; when I’m on the top of the dormitory block, I find myself looking for Ma Lexie’s roof, wondering if Zach or Mikey is now the overseer.

  I slow down as I reach the warehouse. The door needs a good shove. I glance across at the control panels. No one’s there. An alert is repeating on a cycle of three pings followed by a voice: Check oxygen levels in tanks seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven and twelve. I rush towards the raised metal walkway that runs between two rows of tanks, climb the steps and pace the length. The walkway clangs with each step, and the sound echoes across the warehouse. I peer into the green plastic tanks on my left, numbered carelessly in white paint from seven to twelve. I twist around to compare with tanks one to six on my right.

  Fish are sucking air at the water surface in the problem tanks, which is bad news, but easy to fix with extra pumping. The real cause is overstocking. Holden is late in separating the bigger fish, and if we don’t take action they’ll soon start to eat the smaller ones. As problems go, it’s not unusual. Nine times out of ten, it’s either the temperature and oxygen levels, or a blocked filter, or a pump failure.

  Over the years, I’ve seen so many different problems—and watched how they’ve been fixed—that I swear I could do Holden’s job. He’s an enclave resident, and he hates staying at the camp midweek, on call for any emergency. I’m his right-hand man at the fish tanks, even if he doesn’t admit it, and I’m surprised he doesn’t put me in charge of night calls. I guess he needs the extra pay.

  Me, I’d like to spend more time on the salad stacks at the other end of the warehouse—racks and racks, five high in each stack, growing salad leaves and herbs—and all fed by the wastewater from our fish tanks. I help out now and then on the stacks when there’s sickness in the camp and they’re short staffed. Or if there’s a system fail, a die-off, and the racks need replanting. I hope I’ll get the transfer soon. That’s why I’m making a special effort, racing to sort out all the night-time emergencies, take the credit.

  The warehouse door opens and Holden shouts across, “What’s the problem?”

  I tell him to turn up the aeration pumps. I run down to him. “Should we net some of the bigger fish?”

  “Don’t bother. Leave it for the morning.” He walks off. Panic over as far as he’s concerned. If I owned this farm, I’d shift the biggest fish right away.

  I don’t argue with him because my one goal is to keep my job in aquaponics, either here with the fish, or with the salads. The alternative is shovelling rubbish and ash at the power-from-waste plant at the far side of the camp. Aquaponics is the easiest job for any indentured migrant as long as you know what you’re doing, as long as you’re smart enough. Half the migrants allocated to aquaponics are booted out within a month. They don’t get it, that this isn’t a labouring job. There’s hard work for sure, but all day, every day, you have to watch the fish—really observe them—see how they behave. And on the stacks, you have to observe the salad leaves for any sign of distress.

  One day when I’m out of here, with the right-to-remain, I’ll start my own business. A small version of this. I’ve already worked out a plan. I’ll need an abandoned building, a few second-hand tanks, plumbing gear and lighting. Plus the day-to-day supplies like fish food and the small tilapia fry. I hope to find a building that’s close to other food businesses—their waste will be my fish food. Okay, I’ll need more mechanical know-how about fixing the pumps, the biodisks and the like. But I’m picking that up already. I know how the whole process works on our side of the warehouse, from the fish tanks to the settlement and treatment tanks. And that’s the important part, because we have to get it right on our side so that our wastewater is perfect for the hydroponics stacks. I’ve decided I could make a decent living selling fish and salad from even a small operation on a rooftop.

  That’s how I see this unpaid job: I’m an apprentice. It’s the only way I can stop myself from getting hacked off, to pretend the work here is part of my own big plan. I’ll be a fish-and-salad king one day.

  It’s difficult to remember how useless I felt when I arrived here—three years, eight months, two days ago. I kept to myself for a couple of weeks. I watched and made mental notes, listened in on conversations in the canteen. Soon enough I realised I must grab a job at the fish tanks. An older migrant called Javier—Portuguese—gave me a tip-off. At the time, Javier was close to finishing his ten years of indentures, and he showed new arrivals around the camp. I kept close to him, asking questions, and he’s the one who told me you had to be smart to work in aquaponics, warned me we’d soon be taking tests.

  Apart from winning a job in aquaponics, I also knew I had to hang out with the football crew because they were the toughest. No one hassles you if you’re in the first team.

  So, it was all about passing tests of one kind or another. An intelligence test for the aquaponics jobs, and a tough trial to join the football team.

  I had an advantage over the other migrants because my English was far better. Three Spanish boys asked me to help them with their pronunciation. And I did help. Not as much as I could have done, if I’m honest with myself. I made excuses like I felt sick. No way, I thought. No way was I going to help someone if it meant I lost out. That would be stupid. We took the test—maths, reading and writing in English, puzzles—and I scored the top mark out of thirteen migrants in that month’s intake. Three of us were allowed to work with the fish. That’s when I knew things were looking up for me. No high hopes—I was still stuck in a shithole. But for the first time since I left Ma Lexie, when she offered me my own label, I felt a bit special, like I was at the beginning of something better.

  Emergency sorted, I return to the dormitory, and I find a kid in the late-arrivals bunk by the entrance door.

  “You okay? Speak English?” I ask.

  He shakes his head. “Español,” he says.

  I lean in real close because we’re not allowed to speak any foreign language, only English. I ask him in Spanish how long he’s been in the country. He tells me he hasn’t been here long. I’m pleased. The only time we hear any news is when there’s a new arrival. The best informed are those picked up as soon as they arrive in the country. I tell him I’ll see him at breakfast.

  I climb back onto my top bunk and lie flat on my back—that way I’ll sleep deeply even if it means I’ll snore. No one complains about my snoring any longer, not since that Greek kid threw his shoe at me one night. I didn’t challenge him the next morning. No, I waited until our kick-around after our shift. I clobbered him in a tackle, knocked him flat. He reckoned I cracked three of his ribs, but I argued it was an accident. Everyone got the message though.

  Tonight, I’m not dropping back to sleep so easy. I roll onto my side and straightaway I feel guilty. I find myself thinking about my mother, about how she’d sit on my bed when I felt sick, how she’d stroke my hair.

  I told the police and immigration that my parents were both dead. A good son would never do that. It was Jerome who gave me the idea, and I was young then, so he shares the blame. An orphan stood a better chance, he said, and that’s all I could think about as I walked away from him and stepped up to the police station entrance. I chose my story and I’ve stuck to it all this time. It’s probably true. Even if my parents are alive, they haven’t found me, have they? As good as dead, that’s what I tell myself. What’s that English saying? Don’t split hairs.

  When I first said it, that my parents were dead, it felt like the most important moment since I’d left Spain. Because the past became the past. From that moment, I walked into the future. In the interview room, the police officer read my documents, which were creased and water damaged despite all the care I’d taken. She asked if I was hungry. She brought me hot fish and chips from a shop down the street. She sat with me while I ate them, and as soon as I’d finished, she asked all the questions that Jerome had prepared me for. When I’d finished my story, she told me I’d done well, and then she left me on my own. For ages.

  She returned lo
oking hard. A deep crease between her eyes. No more smiles. She’d written a statement for me to sign. She said I must listen carefully. Later in the day, an immigration officer would be arriving from the North of England Migrant Reception Centre outside Liverpool. It’s a big facility, she said, and it would take time to process my request to stay in England. If my request was approved, I’d be sent to an enclave education and indenture camp outside one of the enclaves. Liverpool usually sent migrants to the one outside Frodsham, she told me. I remember she leaned forward and told me she wouldn’t have any more involvement in my application to remain in this country. I remember her next words clearly: “You will only hear from me or my colleagues if we decide to prosecute the man, Jaspar, who held you captive. You’ll be called to give evidence in court.” I felt like throwing up. And I’ve had nightmares about that, meeting Jaspar again.

  The policewoman—she told me to call her Helen—led me to the police station showers. Told me to have a good scrub, that I should try to make a good impression with the immigration officer. Helen said she couldn’t do anything about a change of clothes, because there wasn’t time. But she did bring me two meat pies, saying it might be a while before I had a meal at the Liverpool facility. She was right. After those pies, I didn’t get anything to eat until the following day.

  I lived in a dormitory at the Liverpool facility, like now, and spent four months waiting for something to happen—a decision. I had a weekly interview with Case Officer Farquharson, pronounced Farkuson. Honest, that was a difficult start for any migrant with no English. A warning that English wasn’t easy. The surprising thing about Farquharson was how scruffy she looked, with her hair all over the place and a cardigan with stains. She looked more like a migrant than the migrants. She organised all my medical checks including the DNA test. The worst part was the dental check. I didn’t even have toothache, but the dentist took out three teeth, telling me it was better to take them out early than suffer pain in the future. And I learned later that the indenture camp didn’t get many dental visits. So, I guess it was a good idea to have the three teeth taken out.