The Refugee Sentinel

by Hayes, Harrison

  “So you are going to kill me either today or on Defiance Day. But if I died now, I will save the lives of the people who love me?” Yana said.

  “Your death will save them, yes. It’s something they would have done for you, without hesitation.”

  “And you promise my father is one of these people?”

  “I promise.”

  Broken clouds hung above, completing the carousel’s transformation into an execution alley. Li-Mei lifted Yana by the armpits and walked toward the royal carriage with the steel spike, fewer than ten feet away.

  “I won’t forget you, Yana Perkins,” Li-Mei said and impaled the little girl’s head on the spike. Yana’s feet twitched once. Her eyes filled with blood and her teeth, as they ground themselves to pieces, carved up the inside of her cheeks. Under its own weight, the body slid down until it hit the carriage’s top, then rested there, as if taking a breather.

  Li-Mei stepped back and exhaled; killing children was never easy. She started walking away but a squeak prompted her to turn for a second look. Yana’s eyes, previously open and filling up with blood, were now shut. Li-Mei returned to the carousel and stared at the girl’s dead face. On cue, Yana’s lips curled into a slow smile and her eyelids opened to reveal lucid eye-whites without a single bloodied vessel.

  “Have you forgotten me yet?” Yana said “or have you kept your promise?” As she spoke, the spike inside her mouth glistened like an oversized tongue stud.

  Li-Mei sighed. “I should have cut your head off, little one. Let’s hear you ask questions without a head.” She plunged a kinjal into Yana’s white neck, made whiter still by death, but the blade bounced off with a thud.

  Before Li-Mei’s mind could reject the absurdity of what had happened, she woke drenched and mumbled with a sleepy tongue, as if pierced by a rusted stud. “I hope meeting you in person would be as memorable as meeting you in my dreams, little one.” Then she turned and fell asleep until the morning.

  seven days till defiance day (47

  Above Yana’s head, a bird chirped. She had run outside to look for it, in the embassy’s fenced lawn, and chased the chirp with her eyes but only found the yellow sun, stamping her vision with round blotches. Like that bird, for the most part, Yana felt alone and invisible. She had watched films about birds and seen a stuffed sea hawk in her biology class once, but never the real thing. It was a robin, based on its song, and an impossible one to spot, no matter how she twisted her neck and shielded her eyes with a palm. In another couple of minutes, Yana cut her losses with a sigh and moved on to playing hopscotch. In her mind, she could see imaginary squares drawn over the Seattle grass. Barefoot, she tossed a pebble on the nearest one and hopped forth. The grass, brushing her bare feet, and the invisible robin had somehow led her thoughts to her father. “He’s irresponsible and doesn’t love you,” Mom had said a long time ago in DC and Yana had decided to become the best daughter in the world at doing something important, to prove to him he was wrong to leave. She had thrown herself with equal abandon at homework, house chores and playing the piano Mom gave her for her fifth birthday.

  Time and growing up would, once and again, silence the thoughts of her father. He hibernated in a dark corner of her mind where she didn’t dare go and even forgot it existed. But he never went away; life wouldn’t let him. At school, Yana learned that children often had two parents and that her Mom disliked talking about why Yana was different. So Yana became an expert at reading her Mom’s moods and at filing away scraps of information, on a scavenger hunt for missing memories. She transformed these bits into imaginary stories about her father. Whether he was a pirate or a rich sea merchant, he was always unavailable and always placing other projects above his daughter.

  After a recent sleepover at Gabriella’s, Yana had come home burning with new questions. The Guzmans, unlike Yana and her Mom, ate dinner at a living room table and talked about their day. And though Mr. Guzman had a whiskey smell on his breath, Yana liked the thought of having dinners together every night, as a family. The following evening, before her Mom could take her coat off at the door, Yana attacked with questions.

  “Could we have dinner at our table, Mom?”

  Sarah stretched her lower back. “I thought you had a bite already.”

  “I waited for you to come home.”

  “I’ll fix you something quick then.”

  “I already started something.” Yana spun around. “And I made the table.”

  Her mother had smiled back, but her knuckles whitened as she was hanging her coat. She threw a glance at the kitchen; Yana had chosen a festive tablecloth - lavender blue with yellow dots along the edges. A large salad bowl in the center of the high square table pulled at the eye first with sliced tomatoes, cucumbers and onion circles. Two plates, with silverware flanking each side, and two crystal glasses, filled with what looked like water, completed the ensemble.

  Sarah’s eyes moved from the table to Yana. “Well done, young lady.”

  “I fixed us some scrambled eggs. Left them in the oven, to keep warm.”

  “Thanks for remembering to cook my favorite food.”

  The girl sat, feet dangling at the table and beckoned with a wave. “Sit down, Mom.”

  “What’s the occasion?”

  “I told you. I wanted us to eat at a table. Like Gabriella and her parents do.”

  Sarah scooped some tomatoes on her plate.

  Yana threw the first punch. “Why can’t we have dinner like this, every night?”

  Sarah put a tomato slice in her mouth. “Great idea. We could have gourmet food delivered. How fun would that be? A surprise meal every night and –”

  “I don’t want take-home. I want you to do it.” Yana bit her lip then went nuclear. “I want Dad to come home too. I want the three of us to have dinner, every night.”

  Sarah laid down her fork with care, as if it were a loaded gun. So that’s what the table and eggs and Yana’s sweet smile were about. “Is there something you’d like to tell me?”

  Yana jumped in without a second prompt. “Where’s Dad? Why do we never talk about him?”

  “We’ve covered this before.”

  “We’ve covered nothing.” Yana’s lips stitched shut between sentences. “You’ve told me he didn’t love me and that we’re better off without him. But I want to see him before I die.”

  “Before you die? Silly, you’re eight years old.”

  Yana’s face turned white. She reached for the salad, her hand wrapped around the fork. “I am his daughter and I have the right to know him.”

  “You want to know him?” Sarah wiped her mouth, stood and walked to the window, away from her daughter. “What do you want to know?”

  “Everything.”

  “Everything?”

  “Everything,” Yana said. “I want to know him, not your opinion of him.”

  Sarah hung her head and stomped out of the kitchen. She returned with an envelope in her hand and chucked it at the table with an underhand motion, like a softball pitcher. The envelope landed between the salad bowl and Yana’s untouched plate.

  Sarah’s voice was as hard and sharp as a diamond. “If that’s what you want, then that’s what you’re going to get. It’s all inside. Your father was a certified poker addict who, on a certain August night, seven years ago, while I was at work, came within minutes of murdering you.”

  Yana’s eyes glowed without blinking.

  “He had been grocery shopping, earlier that day, and left a plastic bag next to your crib. I mean, who does that?” Sarah’s fingers stretched and curved, like bird talons. “You were suffocating while he played online poker, in the other room… for fewer than a couple of minutes, he claims, until I called. Maybe it was a couple of minutes, maybe it wasn’t. The single reason, my dear truth-seeker, that you’re sitting in this room with me, hearing my story, and breathing air, is because I called him on that August night. You’re alive because of my premonition or just dumb luck – you choose.” Sarah bit
into a chapped fingernail. “He was sweet, telling me on the phone, while walking to your room, how much he loved me. Whispering it, not to wake you up, what a full day you two had, as his hand was pressing on the door handle and his phone teetered, pinched between ear and shoulder. Pausing a ranked poker game meant he might as well quit, he said, but that’s how much he loved me.

  “I remember hearing the door open, then his screams. Then nothing. His cell must have fallen to the floor.” Sarah covered her face and inhaled through her palms, as if demonstrating what suffocation looked like. “The ER took an hour to restore your pulse. You were in a coma for a month. We didn’t know how your brain would work when you woke. We didn’t know if you’d wake at all.” Sarah sat back down in front of the salad bowl. “I divorced him as soon as you regained consciousness. A week later, the courts issued a restraining order and I haven’t seen him since.” Her voice faltered, its million icicles melting away. “Excuse me, but I lost my appetite. I should get back to the lab, too.”

  Yana was staring at the salad bowl. Her balled fist kept clutching the fork.

  seven days till defiance day (48

  The day had arrived, at last. Waiting in the embassy’s conference room, Colton shoved his stump in the front of his pants, hoping Sarah wouldn’t notice the pocket didn’t bulge where his hand should have been. The wound was infected and the surrounding flesh had started to ooze, but he gritted his teeth and wiped the cold sweat off his face. He didn’t want her to see him in pain when she saw him for the first time in seven years.

  “How have you been?” Sarah said, her eyes glassy with the lack of sleep.

  “I’m good… for someone who has, so far, survived a manhunt by Mrs. Death Star.” His self-deprecating smile fell unreturned. His ex wasn’t in the mood.

  “Look. For what I said… I’m sorry,” she wiped the corners of her mouth mid-sentence. “And for what you did, I —”

  “I’ve forgotten how pretty you were.”

  “Colton...”

  His lips squeezed a smile. “Thanks for coming to Seattle, Sarah. Was she OK to meet me?”

  “She knows you want it and she’ll honor your request.”

  “Did you tell her about me taking her place?”

  “I haven’t, but I’m sure she’ll figure it out.”

  “That’s fine. After Defiance Day she can do whatever she likes.”

  “Why did you agree to go through with the Sacrifice?”

  “Because of you asking me to take her place. And because anyone else in my place would have done it.”

  “Bullshit.” She rolled her shoulders to release tension in her upper back. Her motion reminded Colton, with painful clarity, about the late nights when she would come home, her body liquid with exhaustion and her back shivering with muscle spasms. Sitting at the edge of their bed was the most she could muster. He would massage her back with lavender oil, starting by touching the skin with two fingers then moving up and down the spine, more of a caress than a massage. His fingertips were magical Zen sticks, he would say, sucking out her backache. And he’d go for hours, telling her about his day with Yana and how much or how little the two of them had done. “If you save the world,” he would ask, “who’s going to save you?” and knew they both agreed on the answer, until the accident.

  Today, he would give anything to sit closer to her, in this gray ULE conference room, and massage her sore back again, without a word, as homage to their lives back then.

  “Bullshit,” Sarah said again. “No one else would. I also hope you didn’t do this out of guilt.” She lifted a hand to stop his reply. “So... What do you think… fifteen minutes?”

  Colton’s face twisted. “Just fifteen?”

  The curfew sirens blared outside. “I’d take fifteen, if I were you,” she said.

  “I don’t want to fight, Sarah. The Chinese woman has a monopoly on my fights, these days. I’ll see my daughter for fifteen minutes, but I want to see her at least once more after today.”

  “We’re in Seattle, you might as well. She can meet you this Thursday too, for an hour. But I wouldn’t push for more time or more meetings.” Sarah stood up, putting an end to the argument before it had started. “She’ll be in soon,” she said and left the room.

  Colton shifted in his seat, heart thrashing in his chest, as noisy as the sirens outside. After seven years, he felt like someone who was about to find his lost religion. His good hand hovered over the chair, where Sarah had sat. He felt tired and part of him wondered about walking into the nearest precinct and letting the Asian woman take care of the rest.

  He punched his shoulder with his stump and winced. “Enough… You are Colton Parker,” he spoke out loud. “You give people hope, you don’t destroy it.” Then the door opened and jolted him up. Yana walked in. She took two steps and sat in a chair by the wall, as far as possible from him. He scraped his tongue with his front teeth to freshen his breath and ran his good hand through his hair. He didn’t have a comb; five fingers would have to do.

  seven days till defiance day (49

  Colton rose from his chair, as if Yana were royalty then tumbled back when he saw her face. She was beautiful, more than he knew. If there were a graceful way to pile hundreds of freckles on a human face, it would have been hers. In the same room together, he realized how much he had missed her, and how the years had flown. The eight-year-old smiled at him.

  “Mr. Parker.”

  “Yana. Hi.” He struggled to remember the last time any two words had required this much effort.

  She stared at his eyes with the intensity of an optometrist examining a patient. “We don’t look alike much, do we?” she said and fiddled with a loose lace on her sneaker.

  Each time he had rehearsed their first meeting, he’d sworn he wouldn’t let silence set in. Silence was bad news for men who almost killed their daughters before the daughters were old enough to start teething. Silence made him feel aware of his crumpled face and his teeth chipped at the base and turning yellow in the front. He rubbed his graying short hair with his good hand to conceal a receding hairline. And he hid his right hand in a pocket, thinking she wouldn’t notice. He smiled back but his armpits were swimming with nervous sweat.

  “Your Mom tells me you like sharks,” he said.

  Yana sat, in a far-away chair, with palms tucked under her legs. “Sharks are fine.”

  “Which one is your favorite?”

  “The great white one. Its teeth are a hundred times sharper than razor blades.”

  The toes of her sneakers bounced against one another, dangling in the air. Colton felt like reaching over and caressing her golden hair to test if their years apart had made it softer or pointier.

  “Mom told me you hurt me when I was a baby,” she said, “but I don’t like holding grudges.”

  “This is the best sentence… I’ve heard in a while.” Colton paused at every word as if speaking a foreign language for the first time. “I’ve been a stranger to you.” He tucked a frayed edge on the seat of his chair and patted the smooth bundle with a palm. “But I’d like to change that, if it’s OK.”

  “I’d like that, too.”

  “Do you know what I called you while watching you sleep in your crib?”

  “Tell me.” Her toes kept bouncing against each other.

  Taking his eyes off her felt like passing a kidney stone but on the other hand he didn’t want to stare. “I called you patte.”

  “What does it mean?”

  “In college, I lost a bet to your Mom, where the loser had to enroll in the most obscure course the winner could find. She chose Intermediary Bulgarian. “Patte” means duckling in Bulgarian.”

  Yana wrinkled her nose and looked up from her shoes. “I should get going.”

  “So soon?” Colton said, his face crumpling more.

  “I have to. Plus, Mom said you would see me again tomorrow or the day after.”

  “Of course.” He covered his eyes and when they reappeared, his face was smi
ling. Not a beamer, but a smile anyway, even if surrounded by sadness. “Don’t give Mom a reason to worry, OK? And also... tell her how happy I was to see you.” He raised a finger for emphasis. “One last question before you go – have you been to a wishing fountain in DC?”

  “What’s a wishing fountain?”

  “It’s a place where you can wish for anything then toss a coin in the water for your wish to come true.” Yana tilted her head. She didn’t interrupt. “Many years from now, when this madness is over and you have become a beautiful young lady, you should go to Italy, where so many wishes are made that, from time to time, the authorities have to remove the coins from the fountains and deposit the money in the bank. What I’m trying to say…” he swallowed, “is that the wishing fountain of my life is you.”

  “What do you mean?” Yana’s brows furrowed. “You mean I’m like a water fountain and you’re throwing money at me?”

  “One day you’ll understand.”

  At the door, she waved goodbye and slid out. Colton waved back, spreading his fingers in the air, then walked around the beige table in the middle of the room. A lap later, he sat in a different chair from where he’d started and wished Thursday could come sooner.

  seven days till defiance day (50

  Mitko leaned back from the piano and cracked his knuckles to keep the arthritis at bay. He stood up and with his hands on his hip, took laps around the Stein: right, right then right again; marble floor switched to carpet at each turn.

  A voice flew in from his left. “Your evening workout, I take it?”

  “Ma’am.” Mitko grinned at the air where her voice had come from. She sounded like the patron who disliked Schumann, from almost a month ago. He recalled her name was Li-Mei. “How have you enjoyed your stay with us?”

  “Seattle grows on you, if you let it. Stench and curfew aside, this place must have been beautiful once.”

  “Without eyes, I’m no longer the foremost authority on beauty. But I hear other people feel the same.”