The Beekeeper of Aleppo

by Christy Lefteri

  We sit in a café in the arcade. It smells like vinegar and sherbet. The Moroccan man has some change in his pocket so he buys us all a bright red drink so that we can think about the sky of the Ivory Coast. The drink tastes like cherry-flavoured plastic and is made of crushed ice.

  ‘You be very quiet,’ Diomande says to me, his dark eyes illuminated by the sun so that they are a warm brown now.

  ‘What is the sea like in Syria?’ the Moroccan man asks.

  ‘I live by the desert,’ I say. ‘The desert is as dangerous and as beautiful as the sea.’

  Then the three of us sit there silent for a long time, staring out across the water, imagining our own homes, I guess, what we have lost, what has been left behind.

  By the time we head back, the sun is setting and a strong wind blows across the pier so that its foundations squeak and rattle.

  At the B&B, Afra is not in the living room or the kitchen. I find her in the bedroom, lying on the bed this time, her face still wet with tears. She is holding the marble in her fingers and twirling it around. Sometimes she rolls it over her lips, or along her wrist.

  She doesn’t speak to me when I enter the room, but when I lie down next to her she says, ‘Nuri, have you heard from Mustafa?’

  ‘Won’t you stop asking me?’ I say.

  ‘No. He is the reason we are here!’

  I don’t say anything.

  ‘You are lost in the darkness, Nuri,’ she says. ‘It is a fact. You’ve got completely lost somewhere in the dark.’

  I look at her eyes, so full of fear and questions and longing, and I had thought it was her who was lost, that Afra was the one stuck in the dark places of her mind. But I can see how present she is, how much she is trying to reach me. I stay there until I know she is asleep and then I head downstairs.

  The living room is quiet tonight, the Moroccan man is in the kitchen on the phone, pacing, and now and then raising his voice. Diomande took a shower after the fair and has stayed in his room. There are two or three residents sitting around the dining table playing cards. I sit down at the computer. The light of the TV is flickering in the room.

  I log into my emails quickly before I have a chance to change my mind. There is a message there from Mustafa.

  11/05/2016

  Dearest Nuri,

  I wonder if you made it out of Athens. It is hard for me to sit here not knowing if you and Afra are safe. I hope that you are making your way to us. It was raining today, all day, and I miss the desert and the sunshine. But there are good things here too, Nuri, and I wish that you were here to see. It is a colourful place, full of flowers now in spring. I have just given the third of my weekly workshops to volunteers. One was a Syrian woman who arrived here with her mother and son, another a Congolese refugee who has memories of gathering honey in the jungle, and an Afghan student is already asking how to get her first queen!

  At the moment I have six hives to demonstrate beekeeping and the project is growing week by week. These bees are gentle, not like the Syrian bees. I can even collect the honey without protective gear – I know when they are about to get aggressive because their tone changes. It is a wonderful experience to stand among them exposed like that, and I am getting to know them. Their humming is beautiful – when you hear their song it will fill your heart to the brim with sweetness.

  But sometimes this sound reminds me of everything we have lost and I think always of you and Afra. I hope to hear from you soon.

  Mustafa

  I type a reply and press send.

  Dear Mustafa,

  Afra and I have made it to the UK. We have been here for over two weeks now. I am sorry that I wasn’t in touch sooner. It was a very difficult journey. We are staying at a B&B in the far south of England by the sea. I must stay here until I have my interviews and until I find out whether we have been granted asylum. I am worried, Mustafa. I am worried that they will make us leave. I am so pleased to hear about your project. I wish I could be there with you.

  Nuri

  I think about the cold tone of my email, the fact that I have been here so long and had not contacted my cousin. I am here because of Mustafa, I escaped Athens because of the hope and the will he gave me, but somehow the darkness inside me has swallowed me up.

  I send another message:

  Mustafa, I believe I am unwell. Since I got here my mind is broken. I think I am lost in the darkness.

  I am about to log out when an email comes through:

  Nuri! I am so pleased to hear that you are in the UK at last. This is amazing news! Please send me the address of where you are.

  I find the address on a letter in the bedroom and return to the computer, where I copy it out and press send. I say nothing else to Mustafa and there is no reply after this.

  I fall asleep in the armchair and when I wake up it is dark and the living room is empty. But I can hear the marble rolling across the wooden floor. At first, I can’t see Mohammed but then I realise that he is sitting under the table in the same red T-shirt and blue shorts that he was wearing last time.

  I crouch down to meet his eye. ‘What are you doing under there, Mohammed?’

  ‘This is my house,’ he says. ‘It’s a wooden one, like in The Three Little Pigs – do you remember when you told me that story?’

  ‘Did I tell you that story? There was only one story I ever told you – the one about the brass city. The only person I read that story to was Sami, because I found the book one day on a stall at the souq.’ He is not listening to me; he is busy pushing the marble along the cracks of the wood, then he tucks it under the rug.

  ‘Do you like my house? This house doesn’t break like the houses at home. Isn’t it nice, Uncle Nuri?’

  There is a sharp pain in my head, so sudden and intense that I have to stand up and close my eyes and press my forehead hard with my fingers.

  Mohammed tugs at my jumper. ‘Uncle Nuri, will you come with me?’

  ‘Where?’

  He slips his hand into mine and takes me to the front door. As soon as I open it I realise something is wrong; ahead, beyond the buildings, the sky flashes white and red; from somewhere not too far away there is a wild screech, metal on metal, like a creature being dragged to death, and when the wind blows it brings with it the smell of fire and things burning and ash. I walk across the street, Mohammed’s hand in mine. The houses are bombed-out and they look like carcasses with the light of the flashing sky behind them. We continue along the road. Mohammed is dragging his feet in the dust. It is so thick, like we are walking through snow. There are burnt cars, lines of washing hanging from abandoned terraces, electrical wires dangling low over the street, trash piles on the pavements. It all stinks of death and burnt rubber. In the distance smoke rises, curling into the skyline. Mohammed pulls me by the hand, all the way down the hill, until we reach the Queiq. There are waves on the river and it is darker than usual.

  ‘This is where the boys were,’ Mohammed says, ‘but I was dressed in black so they didn’t see me, they didn’t drown me in the river. Allah looked after me.’ He looks up at me with those wide black eyes.

  ‘Yes,’ I say. ‘He must have.’

  ‘This is where all the children are,’ he says, ‘all the ones who died. They’re in the river and they can’t get out.’

  When I look more closely I notice that there are limbs in the water, and faces. I can make out only blurred outlines in the darkness, but I know what they are. I take a step back.

  ‘No,’ Mohammed says. ‘Don’t be scared. You have to go in.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because it’s the only way to find us.’

  I take a step forward. The water is almost opaque and yet I can see those shadows slithering beneath the surface.

  ‘No, Mohammed, I’m not going to go in there.’

  ‘Why? Are you scared?’

  ‘Of course I’m scared!’

  He laughs, ‘It’s usually me who is scared of the water! How have we swapped places?’
<
br />   He kicks off his shoes and starts to wade in.

  ‘Mohammed, don’t!’ He ignores me, going further, the water rising above his knees and hips and to his chest.

  ‘Mohammed! If you don’t come back now I’m going to get very angry!’ But Mohammed keeps walking. I take a step forward, then another and another until the water is up to my thighs. Something slips past me like a fish or a snake. Just ahead, a small object glimmers on the water’s dark surface, I scoop it into my hands. It is

  was placed in my open palm. ‘Make yourselves at home,’ the smuggler said, and grinned, and I saw that he had a silver tooth in the back of his mouth. His flat was a little way out of the centre of Athens, not too far from the sea. We walked up three flights of stairs because the lift was broken. It was a tiny place that smelt of stale spices.

  At the end of a narrow corridor there was an odd-shaped asymmetrical living area with three rooms leading off it. Every single window faced the brick walls and ventilation systems of the surrounding buildings. The smuggler introduced himself properly as Constantinos Fotakis. I was surprised that his name was Greek as he spoke Arabic like a native, but as I looked at his features and the colour of his skin, it was difficult to know where he was from.

  The key he’d given me was for the bedroom. The room had a double mattress on the floor and an old fur rug which was to be used as a blanket. There was a damp smell, and green mould lined the walls. We could hear the buzz and whir of the vents. The wall of the opposite building was an arm’s length away and the heat and steam from the other flats gathered in the space between the buildings and settled in the room.

  It wasn’t a comfortable place to sleep, but it was better than the park. I wasn’t sure if it was safer though – something about Mr Fotakis made me uneasy; maybe it was his deep throaty laugh, the gold signet ring on his little finger. He was even more confident now than he had been at the café. But he was also friendly; he welcomed us into his flat as if we were family, even insisting on carrying our bags and taking them into the bedroom. He showed us where the shower was, how to use the taps because the hot water sometimes turned cold, he went through the contents of the fridge and told us to help ourselves to anything we wanted. We were treated like special guests. On a small green and bronze coffee table were the stubbed-out butts of cannabis cigarettes and rolled-up twenty-pound notes, which confirmed to me what kind of deliveries I’d be making.

  Later that night Mr Fotakis had friends visiting. There were two of them, and they both slumped into the sofa and bickered for a while over the remote control, as if they were children. To me they looked like brothers, one a bit plump, the other much taller, but their features were the same, both with deep frowns and long noses and eyes that were a little too close together so they always looked a bit startled.

  At around 10 p.m. Mr Fotakis gave me instructions for my first delivery. There were five white boxes and they all needed to be taken to different parts of Athens. He gave me the addresses, the order in which the deliveries needed to be made and the names or nicknames of the people who would be receiving the packages. He also gave me a brand-new iPhone, which I was to use only for work; if I called any other number he would know. He gave me a charger for the van and made sure data roaming was switched on so that I could use Google Maps.

  ‘Drive carefully, now. Don’t kill anyone,’ he said, with a smirk on his face. ‘You have no insurance and no licence.’

  As I was getting ready to leave, Afra was lying down on the bed holding the room key in her hands, close to her chest. When I went over to kiss her on the forehead and to tell her to stay safe, she handed me the key.

  ‘Why are you giving me this?’ I said.

  ‘I want you to lock me in,’ she said.

  ‘Why don’t you lock it from the inside? That way you can get out if you need to.’

  But Afra was shaking her head. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I want you to lock me in.’

  ‘I know the men are dodgy,’ I said, ‘but I don’t think they’ll try anything.’

  ‘Please,’ she said, ‘I don’t want the key. I want you to keep hold of it. I want to know that you have it.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ I said.

  ‘Yes. I’m certain.’ I didn’t really understand her, but I agreed. I put the key in my back pocket and all through the night I kept checking to make sure it was still there. The key made me think of Afra, reminding me that she was in that damp room alone waiting for me. It reminded me of the brick walls and the vents and the men in the living room. The key gave me a determination to keep going, especially during those long hours in the early morning, before the sun had even begun to rise, when I was driving for miles along unfamiliar carriageways, past the shadows of distant villages and towns. I wonder now if she gave me that key to make sure that I remembered her, to ensure that I didn’t drive away and leave her there forever.

  It was a clear night, the sky full of stars. My first delivery was by the port of Piraeus, not too far from where the ferry had dropped us off when we’d come from Leros. The satnav took me off the main road into a residential side street, where the apartments were neat and all had canopies. There was a man already waiting for me, beneath an olive tree, smoking a cigarette. I got out, opened the doors of the white van and gave him the box. He told me to wait there. He went into one of the apartment blocks, stayed there for around ten minutes and came out again, this time holding a white bag which had another package inside. He said I was not to touch or open anything. Mr Fotakis would know if anything at all went missing.

  It was 5 a.m. when I started to head back to central Athens and the sun was rising across the sea, the mountains on the islands blue-grey in the distance. I had the window open so that I could listen to the whisper of the wind and the water, but soon I turned away from the shimmering shoreline and right into the city, with its graffiti and blocks of flats and the dark shadow of the mainland mountains.

  When I got back to the smuggler’s apartment everyone was asleep. I could hear snoring from the master bedroom, and the two brothers were asleep on the sofa, their arms sprawled over each other. I unlocked the door and entered the bedroom. Afra was sitting upright in bed waiting for me.

  ‘Have you not slept at all?’ I said.

  ‘No.’ She was holding her knees.

  I sat down on the bed next to her. ‘I’m here now,’ I said. ‘Why don’t you lie down?’ She lay back and I saw that she was shivering even though it was warm and humid in that room. I didn’t bother to get undressed. I stretched out beside her with my hand resting on her chest and, listening to her heartbeat, I fell asleep.

  We both slept into the early afternoon. I woke up a few times to sounds of plates and cutlery in the kitchen, but I forced myself to go back to sleep. I didn’t want to be awake in this world – my dreams were better than reality, and I think Afra felt the same, because she didn’t move to get up until I did.

  The following night was almost exactly the same, except one of the packages was collected by a man on a boat, who then set off into the dark sea towards one of the islands.

  The days passed like this, sleeping next to Afra by day, with a view of the brick walls through the window and the sounds of the ventilation systems, and then travelling around Athens and its suburbs at night delivering packages to strange men.

  Three weeks came and went. We lived like this for a month. It was taking much longer than Mr Fotakis had promised. He said he was trying to sort out our passports and flights. There were times when I didn’t believe him, when I thought that one day he’d throw us out and we would end up stuck forever in Athens, back in Pedion tou Areos, which for me was the equivalent of hell.

  Then one day he knocked on the bedroom door. It was early afternoon and I’d been dozing next to Afra. When I got up and went into the living area, he had a plastic bag for me. Inside was peroxide hair dye for Afra and some scissors and clippers and good shaving foam for me. ‘I want you to sort yourselves ready for the passport photos,’ he ann
ounced.

  In the bedroom, I took off Afra’s hijab, released her black hair from its bun and followed the instructions on the box, dividing her hair into sections and coating it in the foul-smelling mixture. We left it on for three-quarters of an hour before going into the bathroom and washing it off over the sink. I gave her a towel and waited for her in the living area. Mr Fotakis had made us all some fresh mint tea – he had some pots of herbs on the windowsill which seemed to thrive in the humid air – and we both sat there sipping the tea from small glasses.

  When Afra came out of the bathroom she looked like a different woman. The blonde hair somehow made her look taller, her cheekbones rounder, and although the lighter hair should have made her skin look darker, it somehow created a paler complexion, so white it reminded me of ashes and snow. The grey of her eyes had deepened and there was a shimmer in them as she sat down beside us.

  ‘I smell mint,’ she said, and Mr Fotakis put a glass in her hand. He couldn’t keep his eyes off her.

  ‘You look so different!’ he said, laughing. ‘Amazing how one thing can change a person so much!’ But there was something else in his voice, the same tone that had made me uneasy from the first day we came here. It was the lust and greed that crackled through his phlegm when he spoke, almost hidden, but not quite.

  I cut my hair and shaved well and then I put on a crisp white shirt that belonged to Mr Fotakis. The taller of the two brothers came to take the photos. He positioned us in the light of the window and clicked away until he was satisfied.

  In the evenings I continued to make the deliveries. There were so many packages and as the days passed I would often meet the same people again; they got to know me and trust me, and sometimes they would offer me cigarettes. I was awake only at night, I no longer saw the sun. Afra and I existed in darkness.