Beneath the Darkening Sky

by Majok Tulba

  ‘Obinna,’ I rasp. The name feels strange in my mouth. ‘My name’s Obinna.’

  ‘That’s more like it.’

  The old man leaves with a grunt. Koko watches him go and smiles as he looks back to me.

  ‘My father’s nervous,’ Koko says. ‘It’s treason to harbour a rebel, but he won’t betray you. He’s a good man.’

  ‘My unit,’ I say, ‘was ambushed by government troops. They’re all dead. We all died. I don’t know . . .’ Another coughing fit.

  ‘Don’t worry about it,’ Koko replies. ‘You can tell me later. Just rest.’

  The door creaks open and a girl walks in. She’s maybe fourteen and has the same round face as Koko. Her sarong is knotted tightly under her arms, and her hair is a bright black, falling to her shoulders.

  ‘You are going to clean him up?’ Koko asks.

  ‘Yes,’ she replies. ‘Father sent me.’

  They cut my camos off. The uniform’s all dark and stiff with dried blood. I strain my eyes to see my chest as they clean it. A long gash on my right side has a thick mass of not yet scabbing blood clinging to its edges. They clean off the blood, make proper bandages for my chest and leg. The girl tries to feed me soup, but it tastes like blood. I cough it up. I drift back to sleep.

  When I wake again, I notice a kerosene lamp perched precariously on a woodbox in a corner of the room. It burns feebly against the dim of evening. The deepening shadows jitter against the wall like ghosts. My eyelids are still heavy and my eyes scratch when I blink. My body burns.

  Koko returns with his sister and they kneel down next to me.

  ‘You have a fever,’ the girl says softly.

  ‘One of your wounds is infected,’ Koko adds. ‘But we can’t take you to the clinic. They’ll report you for sure.’

  ‘I’ve been sponging you with cold water,’ the girl continues. ‘But your fever hasn’t broken yet. Father has gone to the village to get medicine.’

  ‘Even that’s dangerous,’ Koko says. ‘People will ask who it’s for. We need to figure out what to do with you.’

  They speak, but delirium pours over me. The kerosene flame is a pair of eyes staring at me with their blue flame. The shadows of my two caretakers skitter and twist into black winged creatures. Beyond my fevered skin, the night is cold. Sleep never comes, just moments of dark cutting between interminable half-waking.

  My caretakers vanish in a long blink, yet the monsters gliding along the walls remain. Death seems more and more favourable. Another long blink and the old man’s snores break the night. They die away into the peaceful night noises, only to shatter that peace again. Blink. I stand below the great pine trees of my village, branches whispering with the wind. Their empty limbs seem to go forever, always beyond the reach of the young climber. They drop dead leaves. The ground around them is thick, dark and warm with rot.

  Night falls quickly. The insect orchestra fills the night. I am a child again, sitting cross-legged on the wet ground, gazing up at the trees and their dizzying branches. Weaverbirds fly in and out and I follow their short flights with wide eyes. They play and fight and sing and mate. They build their nests twig by twig. Thousands flock the air.

  The first light draws its line over the horizon. The shadows recede. Far away, I can hear my name being called and the dawn stings my eyes. The sun is a dot of light among the dying shadows. Slowly it glides towards me, calling out my name. It grows from a dot to a coin to a disc. It’s a gently curved bowl, and finally a blanket of pure light warming my face.

  Hums rise up throughout the village. Gentle beats thud in the background. Plumes of smoke drift above large huts, clusters of women settle around cooking fires, under the shade trees. Young girls huddle, pushed away from the fire by their mothers, who stir the pots and stoke the flames and bicker among themselves about how best to prepare each leg and rib and flank. The old women sit to the back, calling out instructions. Some pots are so big they need two or three women just to stir them.

  I breathe a slow, warm breath on the chest piece of my stethoscope, then rub it against my white coat. A little boy sits on my table with his shirt off, casting a pleading look at me. This is altogether new to him, a long series of firsts, and his big eyes linger, silently begging that I be kind. I give him a smile and press the warm chest piece to his heart.

  His mother rests one hand on his shoulder and bites at her thumbnail.

  I tell the boy to straighten up and I listen to his lungs. In my big black bag several jars of pills and a stack of small plastic bags are bound together. I fetch the jar of red and white pills and scoop twelve of them into a plastic bag.

  ‘Here.’ I hand the bag to the boy’s mother. ‘Two in the morning and two in the evening until they’re gone.’ The boy is slowly and clumsily putting his shirt back on as I tell him, ‘Drink lots of water.’

  He nods at me, wonder mixed with relief. His mother tucks the bag of pills away and hugs me. Thanking me over and over she digs into her pocket for a few old coins.

  ‘That is all I can pay right now,’ she says.

  ‘It’s enough,’ I tell her. ‘Don’t worry.’

  The little boy hops down from the table and extends his hand. I take it and he shakes mine for all that he can. He has a good grip. He runs out of the room and his mother follows, thanking me over and over. I wave goodbye and wait for my nurse to send in the next one. A long line of sick people stretches out the door. Most of them just need to rest and stay hydrated.

  As the day closes and the sun reaches for the horizon, many of my would-be patients decide they aren’t sick enough to miss the party for the clinic opening, and the line dissolves. Without patients, my mind wanders through the village. The men have long since tapped the kegs and the beer is starting to take its hold. They sit in little circles throughout the village, talking over one another, everyone trying to be heard at once.

  I wander the village, taking in the scents of the meats cooking.

  ‘Obinna!’ a voice calls from inside a small hut. A very old man, thin with age and inactivity, sits on the ground inside. One of his grandchildren sits next to him with a knife, helping him eat a bit of goat leg. ‘Obinna, come here!’ the old man calls. ‘Let me touch your face.’

  As I enter the hut, I see the milky white in his eyes. I kneel in front of him and he reaches out for my face. He traces the familiar lines. Then he runs his hands over my arms and legs, occasionally nodding.

  ‘Your father,’ he says, ‘was a great warrior. I used to hunt with him before sight left my eyes.’

  ‘Perhaps I can do something about your eyes, grandfather,’ I reply.

  He chuckles. ‘Everyone who reads and speaks the whiteman language is a liar. Only Jesus can give me back my eyesight. You know, your father was the greatest warrior of his generation. He could bring down a buffalo with just one spear. He did things that other hunters didn’t even dare dreaming of. He could scare a herd of buffalo into a stampede, then run them down and cut off their tails. He’d return to the village with twenty tails for dance decorations.

  ‘Once,’ he continues, ‘he even fought a lion with his bare hands. I thought that was the greatest thing a warrior could do. Today, though, I realised that one creature is even more fearful than a lion – disease. A man who kills disease is the greatest of all warriors.’ The old man spits into his hands, then taps my head, arms and legs. ‘You will be like iron. Even if it’s buried underground, it can’t be touched by the big red termite. Now you can go.’

  ‘Thank you, grandfather,’ I say, standing. ‘Come to the clinic tomorrow and I’ll take a look at your eyes.’

  I’m close now. Just around the next corner is the big open circle for the village. Everyone here wears their best clothes, and they drape each other with beads. The main dance troupe is made up of young girls, the two leaders are fifteen and the youngest is maybe eight. Their dance is frenetic and wild, a testament to the pure energy of their youth. At first glance, their movements seem wild and uncontroll
ed, yet if you really watch, you’ll see their feet land in unison, matching the beat and downbeat of the big drums.

  Everyone in the circle is entranced. Their colourful skirts fly around them as they spin and jump. Orange scarves trail the path of their hands through the air, and they supplement the drums’ music with little rattles tied around their legs. The lead girl’s headdress of shiny black bird feathers flashes in the firelight. An old whistle is balanced between her lips and she blows out the signals for each shift in the dance.

  Their dance goes on and on, yet we never tire of it. It is more than a dance and it is fitting that the youngest people in the village do it. This is the welcome for the clinic and the new world it brings.

  I sit on an old plastic crate that’s been in the village so long no one remembers how it arrived. It is the rubbish of the world beyond the village, and one day it just fell in among us and became part of the village because we could use it. That world out there, the world of universities and jars of pills, all the village has known of it is its trash. Things that world had no use for found some use here, simply because everything here must have a use.

  The clinic itself is a ten-bed building and the only ‘modern’ building in the entire village. It has gypsum board for walls and a roof of corrugated aluminium. It’s painted blue, green and purple to make people more comfortable coming in. The inside is plainer, but it has a wooden floor, sanded even, no splinters. When the villagers saw that, they all wiped their feet before they came in. They’d never done this before in all their lives.

  By midnight the dancing has become less focused. The drums dim to background noise, the beer now keeps the beat and everyone hears it a little differently. The spirits of great poets attempt to rise in the dancers, who concoct new rhymes to old tunes. But the old spirits are rusty. People lie on the ground, making token efforts to get up. Some sleep in the least comfortable positions imaginable.

  Pina moves through the crowd. I force myself to rise slowly.

  She stops in front of me, just out of arm’s reach. A little smile creeps into the edge of her mouth and she takes a step back. I follow.

  We dance a little apart. Other girls glide past, touching my arm, trying to turn me, to pull me into their circles. But I let each one go. I feel like everyone is watching us, Pina and me. Yet even as I think this, the crowd disperses. They stumble back to their huts or help their less able friends to some place to recover. The fire dwindles, and Pina and I dance away from the circle. Two lone drummers beat slowly.

  ‘I saw the girls,’ Pina says. ‘Everyone wants to get their hands on the famous doctor.’

  ‘And which of the men wouldn’t kill for a day with Pina?’ I reply.

  ‘So, Mister Big Famous Doctor Man, how does it feel to have this whole festival, all for you?’

  ‘It’s not about me. It’s the clinic. I’m just a kid who grew up here, went off to school and then came back. That’s all. Who knows, I might even die here. Maybe I’ll get married here.’

  ‘Married?’ We are standing very close together now. My forehead floats just above hers. ‘No. You’ll be too busy taking care of the sick.’

  ‘I’ve got the others helping me out.’

  ‘Okay, famous doctor man, how many wives will you have?’

  ‘Hmm . . .’ I inch a little closer, our foreheads touch. We’re breathing quicker. ‘I think thirty’s a good number.’

  ‘Uh-huh.’ I can hear Pina’s smile better than I can see it. ‘Lower.’

  ‘Okay, twenty.’

  ‘Lower,’ I can feel her breath against my lips.

  ‘All right. Ten.’

  ‘Mmm . . . lower.’ The very tip of her tongue brushes my lips.

  ‘Five.’

  ‘No. Lower.’

  My hand rests on her hip, the curve perfect against my palm. ‘Fine. Have it your way.’

  Her body rises into mine. Warmth floods over me as our lips touch. The heat spreads.

  ‘Obinna!’ the voice says. ‘Obinna! Come on, Obinna!’

  The voice is desperate. Beads of sweat form on my skin. Each droplet cuts a stream across my face, chest and legs. One venturing drop beads into my eye and the sting draws me from my dream. My eyelids flutter madly against the saltwater burn. A hand is brushing against my face. The girl wipes away the sweat with a cloth and I feel the draft of an open window. The family is all at my side, father, son, daughter. Flashes of distant memories, my own family at my mat, tending to me.

  ‘We thought we’d lost you for a second,’ Koko says.

  ‘Water,’ I rasp. Koko lowers his ear to my mouth and I repeat my plea.

  For days I slowly recover. My days with these God-sent hosts are painful in every way. Two weeks of chills and fever and half-dreams twisting the daylight and haunting the night.

  At last I am able to walk out into the open air. Hobbling on my weakened legs and ginger with my arms, the chest wound intolerably painful.

  This first day on my feet, I push the thin door open and take in the world beyond the sliver I’ve seen through the entry. It’s a good-sized village, off in the distance. At this edge, the houses are sparser and only a few huts extend away from the centre. It is peaceful, until I hear feet racing towards me. Training has taught me to move faster than I can at this moment. Attempting to spin, ready to fight, I nearly topple.

  It’s the girl, running up to me with a bucket of water jerking in her hand. She drops it by the door and gently, but quickly, pushes me back inside.

  ‘What are you doing?’ she says, pulling the door closed. ‘If people see you, they’ll start asking questions.’

  ‘I know,’ I say. ‘That’s why I need to leave. Your family has risked enough already.’

  The door swings open again and her father walks in. ‘You’re too weak,’ he says. ‘I don’t know where you mean to get to, but you won’t get there before someone gets a hold of you.’

  I see suspicion or fear in his eyes.

  ‘I’m not going back. I don’t want to return to the rebels or bring them here.’

  The old man nods. ‘You still can’t leave.’

  The girl adds, ‘Baba’s right.’

  ‘Why are you helping me?’ I ask.

  ‘Because you need it,’ she replies. She studies my face, like she isn’t sure about something. ‘Are you really a soldier? Do you really kill people?’

  ‘I was, yes,’ I say. ‘But I don’t want to go back. Really.’

  ‘Well,’ she says. ‘I was against bringing you here.’

  I watch her eyes.

  ‘I have thought,’ she continues, straightening up and fiddling with her wrap, ‘that I could strangle you in the night.’

  ‘Why didn’t you?’ I ask.

  ‘Because I thought it’s what you would have done,’ she replies. ‘People talk a lot about you rebels, in this village. They’d beat even a pregnant woman for helping one of you.’

  Maybe she’s taunting me. ‘You could give me to the government.’

  ‘Believe me,’ she says, with a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. ‘I’m thinking about it. I can make twenty dollars.’

  ‘I can give you something worth more than that.’ And I give her the only thing I have of any value, the only information I have – where the camp is, and where the football field is, which is near here. If she wants something to sell, something in return, then she has it.

  Her father clears his throat and pushes the door open again. She rushes out and he follows. I hear her trotting away, her bucket sloshing. The old man sits by the door and hums quietly.

  All I want to do is leave. I hope and I pray. I dream of running. Maybe we’re close to the border. Maybe I can get to some other place that has no war. Maybe that would be easier than going home. Flying up from the cot, I run. My left leg makes long strides, my stiff right leg drags behind. The night is cool but night sweat clings to my forehead and chest. Dim lights burn in the village. I tear off in the opposite direction. My toe catches and I stumb
le to the ground. As I hit the earth reality jolts through me.

  What am I running from? A dream? I had a dream, of the Commander capturing me and Christmas. Of him laughing that no one can escape him, that there is no way to be free of his power.

  Years. I’ve been a soldier for years. Countless first days. I’ve forced myself to forget, but that knowledge is still there. That dream, that nightmare, is years of fear and terror surfacing. For the first time in so very long, I’m somewhere else. I’m so used to being afraid that my mind has to create nightmares to feel normal. That’s all. That’s all it was.

  My fever has broken.

  I sit up, embracing the cold air. It’s a cleaner smell than the camp. How long ago did I stop noticing the scent of shit? The fear of my nightmare drifts away and I fill my lungs with deep cleansing breaths.

  I wonder what I tripped on. I gingerly get up and walk a few steps back. I kneel in the light of a quarter-moon. The shadows are long and the light is dim, but closer inspection reveals tyre tracks. The ground is hard and pale, it hasn’t rained in a while. My memory of the last couple of weeks is vague, but I don’t remember any rain. Perhaps these tracks are left over from the night they brought me here, from that storm.

  No soldiers returned from that mission to raid the truck. Even if someone was left alive, I’d never heard of anyone going back for survivors. The fallen were left to rot. I laugh at myself. They’ll all think I’m dead. The Commander and Parasite and the Mobile Force. They’ll all think I’m dead.

  I can’t hold back my smile. ‘I’m dead!’ I shout to the stars and burst out laughing. Deep, uncontrollable laughs. I just lie there, my chest naked except for the bandage, wearing a pair of Koko’s old work jeans, rolling on the hard dirt, laughing my ass off. I haven’t laughed, not really, in so long. My face and belly hurt. I can feel my wounds opening. Oh, it’s so beautiful.