2006 - What is the What (54 page)

I turned to find a man, an elderly man, lying prone and twisted like a root, near the back of the truck.—I’m sorry, I said.

The truck jerked and the old man’s head hit the back hatch. He moaned.

We were moving, and the truck quickly picked up speed. I gripped the side of the truck and tried not to look at its cargo. I looked into the sky but then the smell overtook me. I gagged.

—You’ll become accustomed to it, the man said.—It’s a human smell.

I tried to move my foot but found it stuck; blood covered the truck floor. I wanted to jump but the truck was traveling too fast. I looked forward, wanting to get the attention of the driver. A head emerged from the passenger side of the truck cab. A cheerful man hoisted himself so he was sitting on the window ledge, looking back at me. He seemed to be an SPLA soldier, but it was difficult to tell.

—How are you back there, Red Army?

—I’d like to get out please, I stammered. The maybe-rebel laughed.

—I’ll walk back. Please. Please, uncle. He laughed until tears filled his eyes.

—Oh Red Army. You are too much.

Then he slipped back into the cab.

A moment later, the truck swerved and I lost my footing, and for a second I found my knee in the broken thigh of a dead soldier, whose open eyes stared into the sun. As I raised myself, I glanced over the contents of truckbed. The corpses were arranged as if they had been thrown. Nothing held them in place.

—It’s pitiful, it is, the old man said.—Many of us were alive when we left Sudan. I’ve been keeping the vultures away. A dog jumped aboard yesterday. He was hungry. The truck jumped again and my foot slipped on something viscous.

—The dogs now, they have a taste for people. They go straight for the face. Did you know that? It was lucky that one of the men in the cab heard the dog. They stopped the truck and shot it. Now it’s just the four of us, he said.

Four aboard were yet alive, though it was difficult to find them, and I was not sure the old man was correct. I glanced to a body next to him. At first it seemed that this man’s arms were hidden. But now it was clear, because I could see the white bones of his shoulders, that the man’s arms had been removed.

The truck swerved wildly again. My right foot landed on the arm of a teenage boy, wearing a blue camouflage uniform and a floppy hat.

—He’s still alive, I think, the old man said.—Though he hasn’t spoken today.

I raised myself again and heard wild laughter from the truck cab. They’d swerved on purpose, each time. The cheerful man’s head again appeared from the passenger window.

—The driver is very sorry, Red Army, he said.—There was a lizard in the road and he was very concerned about killing such a creature of God.

—Please uncle, I said. I don’t want to be here. I want to leave. If you could only slow down a bit, I’ll jump off. You don’t need to stop.

—Don’t worry, Red Army, the maybe-rebel said. His face and tone were suddenly serious, even compassionate.—We only have to drop the wounded at Lopiding Hospital, and then bury the bodies over the hill, and we’ll have an empty truck all the way to Sudan. Wherever you need to go.

The truck had taken a bump and the man’s head had struck the top of the window frame. Soon he was inside the truck again, yelling at the driver. For a moment the truck slowed and I thought I had a chance.

—Take the ride, boy. It was the old man.

—How else will you get to Sudan? he said. He looked at me then, as if for the first time.

—Why are you going back, anyway, boy?

I did not consider telling the man the truth, that I was trying to recycle, to get another ration card. It would seem ridiculous to a man struggling to live. The people of southern Sudan had their problems, and by comparison the mechanisms of Kakuma, where everyone was fed and was safe, were not worth mentioning.

—To find my family, I said.

—They’re dead, he said.—Sudan is dead. We won’t ever live there again. This is your home now. Kenya. Be glad for it. This is your home and it will always be your home.

A sigh came from below my feet. The teenage boy turned over, his hands praying under his ear as if he were comfortably at home on a pillow of feathers. I looked down at him, determined that I should focus on him, for he seemed most at peace. My eyes assessed him quickly—I could not control them, and cursed them for their speed and curiosity—and realized that the boy’s left leg was missing. It was now a stump covered with a bandage fashioned from a canvas tarpaulin and rubber bands cobwebbed to his waist.

The ride, I now know, was less than an hour, but it is impossible to convey how long it seemed that day. I had covered my mouth but still I gagged continuously: I felt chills, and my neck seemed numb. I felt sure that this truck represented the devil’s most visible deeds, that in every way it symbolized his work on Earth. I knew I was being tested, and I rode until the truck finally slowed upon reaching the driveway to the Lopiding Hospital.

Without hesitation I jumped over the side and tumbled onto the ground. I meant to outrun the truck and find safe haven in the clinic. Upon landing on the hard dirt, I needed a moment to re-engage with the world, to know that I was not dead myself, that I had not been cast into Hell. I stood and felt my legs and arms working and so I ran.

—Wait, Red Army! Where are you going?

I ran from the truck, which was slowly traversing a series of potholes. I ran and outpaced the vehicle easily, aiming myself for a building on the end of the compound.

Lopiding was a series of tents and a few white brick buildings, sky-blue roofs, acacia trees, plastic chairs set outside for waiting patients. I ran to the back of a building and almost knocked over a man holding a false arm.

—Careful, boy!

The man was Kenyan, middle-aged. He spoke to me in Kiswahili. All around him were the makings of new feet, legs, arms, faces.

—Hey Red Army! Come now. It was the soldier from the truck.

—Take this. Put it on.

The Kenyan gave me a mask, red, too small for me. I sank my face into it. I could see through the holes for eyes and the Kenyan tied it closed.

—Thank you, I said.

He was a constant-smiling man, heavy-jowled and with great sloping shoulders.

—No need, he said.—Are they still looking for you?

I peered around the corner. The two men from the truck were walking toward the building. They went inside for a moment and returned to the truck with a canvas stretcher. They first unloaded the old man, and brought him inside. They returned to the truck and retrieved the teenage boy with the missing leg, and he lay on the stretcher just as he had in the truck, looking as comfortable as could be. These were the only two passengers who disembarked at Lopiding. The rest were dead or would soon be dead. The men threw the stretcher into the back of the truck and the driver climbed into the cab. The other man, maybe-rebel who taunted me, stood with one hand on the door handle.

—Red Army! Time to go! You can ride in the cab this time! he yelled.

Now I was unsure. If I did not take this ride I would probably not get another. I stepped out from the building. The maybe-rebel looked directly at me. He dropped his hand from the truck, and tilted his head. He was staring into me, but made no movement, and neither did I. I felt safe behind the mask. I knew he would not know me. He turned from me and yelled up into the trees, looking for the boy who had been in the truck.

—I’m sorry, boy! the man yelled.—I promise we’ll take you to Sudan. Safe and sound. Last chance.

I stepped forward, toward the truck. The Kenyan grabbed my arm.

—Don’t go. They’ll get a price for you. The SPLA would be happy to have a new recruit. Those guys would be paid well for delivering you. It was an impossible decision.

—I’ll get you back to Sudan if you need to go, the Kenyan said.—I don’t know how, but I will. I just don’t want you getting killed over there. You’re too skinny to fight. You know what they do, right? You train for two weeks and then they send you to the front. Please. Just wait here a second till they leave.

I wanted so badly to join the men in the truck, wanted to believe their promise to keep me with them, in the cab, to deliver me safely over the border. And yet I found myself trusting the Kenyan, whom I did not know, more than my own countrymen. This happened occasionally and always it was a conundrum.

I was still standing in full view of the man from the truck, and again he fixed his eyes on me. It was so pleasing to wear that mask, to be invisible!

—Final chance, Red Army! he said to the boy he thought he was looking for.

The man shielded his eyes from the sun, still trying to figure out why this boy with a mask seemed so familiar. And still I stood, emboldened, until he finally turned back to the truck, lifted himself into it, and left in a cloud. The Kenyan and I watched the truck disappear into the orange dust.

I didn’t want to remove the new face. I knew that the Kenyan would not give it to me, and I wondered briefly if I could escape with it at that moment. Perhaps the mask would make it possible to run—back to Kakuma or into Sudan—undetected. I luxuriated in the thought of presenting this new face to all the world, a new face, without marks, blemishes, a face that told no tales.

—Doesn’t fit you, boy, the Kenyan said. His hand was on my shoulder, his grip strong enough that I knew escape was impossible. I took the mask off and handed it to the Kenyan.

—Where will they bring the bodies? I asked.

—They’re supposed to bring them back to Sudan, but this is not done. They’ll drop them in the creek and take paying passengers back to Sudan.

—They’ll bury them at the creek?

—They won’t bury them. Does it make a difference? They get buried, they’re eaten by worms and beetles. They don’t bury them, they’re eaten by dogs and hyenas.

The man was named Abraham. He was a doctor of sorts, a maker of prosthetics. His shop was behind the hospital, under a yawning tree. He promised me lunch if I could wait an hour. I was happy to wait. I did not know what doctors ate for lunch but I imagined it was extravagant.

—What are you making now? I asked.

He was fashioning something like an arm or shin.

—Where do you live? he asked.

—Kakuma I.

—Did you hear an explosion last week?

I nodded. It had been quick, a pop, like the sound of a mine coming alive.

—A soldier, SPLA, a very young one, was visiting his family in the camp. This was Kakuma II. He had brought some souvenirs home to show his siblings. One of the souvenirs was a grenade, so here I am, making a new arm for the soldier’s little brother. He is nine. How old are you?

I didn’t know. I guessed that I was thirteen.

—I’ve been doing this since 1987. I was here when they opened Lopiding. It was fifty beds then, one big tent. They thought it would be temporary. Now there are four hundred beds and they add more every week.

Abraham carved the plastic as it cooled.

—Who is this for? I said, picking up the mask I had worn.

—A boy’s face was burned off. There’s much of that. The kids want to look at the bombs. One boy last year had been thrown onto a fire.

He held his creation to the light. It was a leg, a small one, for a person smaller than me. He turned it around and around, and seemed satisfied.

—Do you like chicken, boy? It’s time for lunch.

Abraham brought me to a buffet line, arranged in the courtyard. Twenty doctors and nurses lined up in their uniforms, blue and white. They were a mixed bunch: Kenyans, whites, Indians, one nurse who looked like a very light-skinned Arab. Abraham helped me with my plate, filling it with chicken and rice and lettuce.

—Sit over here, son, he said, nodding his head to a small bench under a tree.—You don’t want to sit with the doctors. They’ll ask questions, and you never know where that might lead. I don’t know what kind of trouble you’re in.

He watched me tear into my chicken and rice; I hadn’t had meat in months. He took a bite of a drumstick and stared at me.

—What kind of trouble are you in?

—I’m in no trouble, I said.

—How did you get out of Kakuma? I hesitated.

—Tell me. I’m a man who makes arms. I’m not an immigration officer. I told him about sneaking away and bribing the police officers.

—Amazing how easy it is still, right? I love my country, but graft is as much part of life as the air or soil. It’s not so bad to live in Kenya, right? When you’re old enough, I’m sure you’ll find a way out of the camp, and to Nairobi. There you can find some kind of job, I’m sure, maybe even go to school. You seem smart, and there are thousands of Sudanese in the city. Where are your parents?

I told him I didn’t know. I was dizzy with the taste of chicken.

—I’m sure they’re fine, he said, examining his chicken and choosing the location for his next bite. With his mouth full, he nodded.—I’m sure they lived. Did you see them killed?

—No.

—Well then, there’s hope. They probably think you’re dead, too, and here you are in Kenya, eating chicken and drinking soda.

I believed the words of Abraham, simply because he was educated and Kenyan and perhaps had access to information that we did not inside the camp. The separation of life inside Kakuma and in the rest of the world seemed completely impenetrable. We saw and met people from all over the world, but had virtually no hope of ever visiting any other place, including the Kenya beyond Loki. And so I took Abraham’s words as those of a prophet.

We finished our lunch, which was delicious and by volume too much for me to consume; my stomach was not accustomed to this much food in one sitting.

—How will you get back to Kakuma? Abraham asked. I told him I still intended to try to make my way to Narus.

—Not this time, son. You’ve seen enough for this trip.

He was right, of course. I had no will left. I was broken for now, and the plan was broken and all I could do now was return to Kakuma, with nothing gained or lost. I thanked Abraham and we promised to meet again, and he put me on an ambulance going to Loki. There, I waited for any trucks going to Kakuma whose drivers would not ask questions. I saw no sign of Thomas and so did not venture into the Save the Children compound. I walked up and down the dirt roads of Loki, hoping an opportunity would reveal itself before nightfall, when I knew that the Turkana would see me as a target.