One Secret Summer (29 page)

‘Not very long,’ she said with a faint smile. ‘It’s actually my first assignment.’

‘You’re very good at it.’ The words were out before he could even think about them. She said nothing, but looked up at him,
a quizzical expression in her eyes, as if she didn’t quite believe him. ‘No, really. I mean it. You know how to work with
these people. Not many of the interpreters I’ve come across can do that.’

She shrugged. ‘They’re my people,’ she said simply. ‘We understand each other.’

‘Do you still have family down here?’

‘No.’ She didn’t elaborate. She turned the length of her profile away from him, looking out to sea. He was aware that there
was more to the statement than she was prepared to give away, at least for now, and it came as something of a surprise to
him that he was prepared to wait. He said goodbye and walked slowly back to his quarters, his brows knitted together in a
frown of concentration. He would have to be careful with her, he realised, although strangely, he wasn’t altogether displeased
by the revelation. She touched him but he had no idea why.

Niela watched Josh walk away and disappear into the building where his room lay. He walked with a slow, graceful swagger,
his tall, lean body completely at ease with everything around him, including himself. She was intrigued by him. After a week
of working alongside him, she began to sense something else beneath the surface of his impatience. There was an intuitive
compassion in him that seemed to be at odds with his brusque nature. It was clear he was good at his job. The men who worked
under him respected him; she could see it in the way they looked at him or listened to him. Within a day or two, she saw that
he would have eventually managed on his own, even without language … he was acutely aware of the subtle imbalance in power
between them and he tried, wherever he could, to redress it. He had a way of asking a question that was really a provocation,
which delighted them, especially the older
men. After decades of being shouted at or worse, they seemed to appreciate the respect he accorded them and they returned
it tenfold. And although she’d yet to see it directed at her, there was an extraordinary charm at work beneath the tight-lipped
exterior and the barely controlled rage. She listened to him joke once or twice with someone whose grasp of English or French
was sufficient for them to properly communicate – he had a dry, quick sense of humour and when he smiled, his whole face lit
up, utterly transformed. A deep coppery glow travelled up from underneath the V of the T-shirts he wore every day, lighting
his neck and face. There was a line of paler skin at his biceps where the sun hadn’t reached, and every now and then she caught
a glimpse of his torso as he stretched for something or jumped up on to the scaffolding, the wind tugging at his T-shirt.
The almost feminine whiteness of his skin there startled her.

Now, after the brief exchange, which couldn’t have lasted more than a minute or so, she sensed a shift in him towards her
that she couldn’t quite put her finger on. She had the sense that getting any closer to Josh Keeler would be like coming close
to a flame. There was a warmth in him that she’d only just begun to see, but it was the sort of warmth that would, given the
slightest chance, burn. Yes, better to keep a distance. Safer that way.

She was eating lunch alone the following day on the terrace overlooking the bay. The sun was blinding. The only point of colour
in the bleached, arid landscape was the sea. She had just poured herself a second cup of coffee when she saw Josh walk out
of his building and make his way across the yard towards her.

‘I’m going into town for supplies,’ he announced without preamble. ‘Want to come?’ She looked up at him, hurriedly
swallowed a mouthful of coffee, and nodded wordlessly. ‘I’ll leave in about five minutes. Can you be ready?’

She nodded again. ‘Sure. I’ll just get my bag,’ she said, getting up from her seat. He nodded without saying anything and
turned on his heel.

He hardly talked as he drove away from the camp, but it didn’t bother her. She turned her head to look out of the window.
It was the first time she’d left the camp’s confines since she’d arrived. The horizon was still and empty; it was scored across
the dashboard like a slash. The hills were dotted with hard-edged boulders, glinting white in the sunlight. They changed slowly
in form and aspect as the car advanced, then left them behind. There wasn’t a single car travelling in the opposite direction.
Aside from the odd goat-herder who looked up curiously as the car sped past, there was no one else on the road. Niela glanced
at Josh’s hands on the wheel. Strong, capable hands, she noticed. She let her eyes wander up the length of his forearm. It
was covered in fine, silky brown hair. The sun had ripened his skin like fruit; there was an olive graininess to him that
seemed very un-English to her. He wore a ragged woven bracelet on one wrist of the kind that she’d worn for a couple of months
as a teenager. The kind you gave to your best friend in high school. The colours were faded. She found herself wondering briefly
who’d given it to him. The vehicle gave a sudden soft shudder as they skirted over a pile of loose rocks, reminding them of
the inhospitable terrain outside. ‘There’s water on the back seat.’ Josh spoke suddenly. ‘If you’re thirsty.’

‘Thanks.’ She turned her head to look out of the window again. The landscape was almost lunar. Nothing around them but blackened
volcanic rock, bleak sweeps of mountainsides, not a single tree. Far below in the bay, the choppy blue sea was puckered with
rippling white waves, visible even at that distance. Cocooned in the air-conditioned interior, it was hard to fathom the heat
outside. ‘What d’you need to buy?’ she asked after a while.

‘Building supplies. Some nails and screws, a bit of rope. We’re almost finished with the septic tanks but I want to put in
an extra water tank before we start on the huts.’

‘How long is it all going to take? The whole camp?’

‘Depends. If I get the labour I need, another couple of months. There’s Ramadan next week, though, and that always slows things
down. I’ll be glad when it’s over. Fasting in this heat is hard.’

‘You fast?’ she asked, surprised.

‘Of course.’

‘I haven’t fasted for years,’ she said after a moment. ‘I don’t know why. I … I forget, I guess.’

‘Easier to forget about Ramadan in London. Can’t do that here.’

‘You were in Morocco before this, right? You have the accent. I can hear it when you speak Arabic.’

He turned his head to look at her briefly. ‘That’s the longest sentence I’ve heard you say,’ he said, smiling faintly.

‘Well, you hardly talk much either,’ she said mildly. ‘Whereabouts in Morocco were you?’

‘Smara. Close to the border with Western Sahara.’

‘And before that?’

‘Bosnia.’

‘Why?’ She drew her legs up under her.

‘Why what?’

‘Why those places? You’re an architect, aren’t you? Why go there?’

He gave a short laugh. ‘Architects aren’t supposed to work in places like that?’

‘Well, I haven’t met any architects who do.’

‘More’s the pity,’ he said drily. ‘Camps are human settlements. That’s what we’re trained to provide. You can’t leave it to
bureaucrats. Like our friend Nancy, for example.’

She nodded slowly. ‘You’re right, I suppose. We’re so used to thinking about camps as temporary measures, you forget that
some of them have been around longer than many towns.’

She felt his gaze shift towards her. ‘Exactly. Where’s home for you?’

‘London. I’ve been there four years now.’

‘And your family? I asked you before but you didn’t really answer.’

She was quiet for a moment. ‘They live in Vienna. I had an uncle living there. We went when the war broke out.’

‘Why did you go to London?’

She didn’t answer but turned her head towards the window again. The figure of a woman appeared slowly in the distance, distinguishable
by her brightly coloured garb, but Niela’s measure of distance was warped and they came upon her too suddenly. She herded
a small flock of goats and raised her stick as they passed, in greeting or protest, Niela couldn’t tell. She turned back to
Josh. He didn’t press her at all. She liked that about him. She took a deep breath. There was only one person she’d ever spoken
to about Hamid, and that was Anna. She had no idea why she felt she could tell this man, a complete stranger and someone whom
she would never see again once her job here was ended. But she could. At least part of it. ‘A marriage,’ she said finally.
‘An arranged marriage.’

‘Ah. You escaped it?’

She nodded slowly. ‘The usual story. You know how it goes.’

‘No, I don’t. What happened?’ he asked, and his voice was gentle.

To her horror, she found her eyes flooded with tears. She struggled to contain the wave of sadness that surged inside her.
Just as before, he was patient, giving her the time and space to respond – or not, if she chose. She took another deep breath,
hoping her voice was steady. ‘I wasn’t prepared for it. It wasn’t the way I’d been brought up. My father is …’ she stumbled
over the words, ‘
was
modern. We … I went to an international school, I was going to go to university, normal stuff. But the war changed everything.
We left with nothing.’ She paused for a second, remembering her mother’s words. She didn’t know
why, but she didn’t want Josh to think badly of them. ‘I think they thought it was the best they could do for me.’

‘But presumably
you
didn’t think so?’

She shook her head. ‘No. He … he was much older than me. A distant relative.’

‘So you ran away instead?’

‘Yes. To London.’

‘That takes some nerve. And now here you are, rolling around Djibouti in a Land Cruiser with a complete stranger.’

‘You’re not a stranger. A bit distant, perhaps.’ The words slipped out without her thinking. She was surprised. She was responding
to something in his tone that she couldn’t place; the tenor of their conversation kept shifting. Flirtation? He hardly seemed
the type. No, it wasn’t flirtation. It was stronger than that, yet less. She was suddenly unsure of herself.

He laughed. ‘Distant. Well, you’re not the first to accuse me of it, you know.’

‘It’s not an accusation,’ she said sharply, partly to cover her confusion. ‘It doesn’t bother me. I don’t care how … no, not
that, I just meant …’

‘I know what you meant,’ he said quietly.

Niela looked at him uncertainly. She was moved by his quiet assertion, but before she could say anything further, the vehicle
began to slow down. They were approaching a roadblock, the first of several before the city began. ‘
Salaam alaikum
.’ Josh kept a hand on the gear stick as he passed their documentation through the window to the bored-looking soldier. The
officer peered at them curiously through the window.

‘Your wife?’ he asked.

‘
Aiwa
.’ Yes. It was simpler that way.

‘OK.’ He handed back their passports and slapped the roof of the car. They drove on in cautious silence.

The town was busy. It was the last Saturday before Ramadan and the shops were full of people. Josh wound his way through the
narrow, pot-holed streets and finally pulled up in front of a
long row of arcades, outside a shop with a bright green banner.
Ali Hassan & Sons, Purveyors of Building Supplies
. He glanced at Niela. She was sitting upright, looking around her with interest. She was wearing a light pink
dirac
that was tucked up around her knees. Her feet were still up on the dashboard; dark red toenails, he noticed. Sexy. Her bare
leg was smooth and dark without a single blemish. He stopped himself quickly. ‘Coming?’ he asked. She nodded and opened the
door.

‘
Ahlan
,’ he called out as he walked through the arcade and stepped through the doorway of Ali’s shop.

‘Joshua!
Al-Hamdulillah
!’ Ali came through from the back of the shop, wiping his hands. They exchanged the traditional greeting and sat down. Josh
saw from Niela’s expression that she noticed and approved of the way he put his left hand on his lower right arm when they
shook hands and the way he adopted the correct position on the floor. He couldn’t have said why it pleased him. What did he
care? In a fortnight she’d be gone.

Ali’s wife interrupted them, bringing tea. She served Josh first as was their custom – he was the male guest in their home.
He avoided looking at her – she was another man’s wife, after all – and drained the glass in two gulps so that she could rinse
it and serve the others. He liked the rituals of the culture here; slower-paced, more gracious than the back-slapping intimacy
of Westerners that usually petered into nothingness. Niela chatted to Ali’s wife in their language in a low tone, her face
partially turned from his. He saw from Ali’s expression that he was confused by her presence. But there was no time to dwell
on it or explain. He had supplies to collect and he wanted to get back to the base well before nightfall.

It took them almost an hour to find what he needed and load the vehicle. There was one last handshake, a flurry of goodbyes
and
salaams
, and then they were finally off. There were a few American soldiers in town, he noticed, conspicuous in their bulky camouflage
uniforms and mirrored Ray-Bans. There were others, too, in khaki shorts and starched shirts.

‘Who’re they?’ Niela asked him, pointing to a group standing by the side of the road.

‘
Légion Étrangère
. The French Foreign Legion. They’ve been here since the sixties.’

‘You seem to know a lot about Djibouti.’

‘Might as well know what you’re getting into.’ He swung out into the flow of cars. It was almost 4 p.m. and the traffic was
already starting to thicken. ‘I just need to stop by one more place,’ he said, turning the vehicle down one of the side roads.
‘Ali didn’t have any steel wire. I won’t be a minute.’

The road was narrow and even more potholed than the one they’d just left. The vehicle swayed alarmingly from side to side;
Niela was thrown against him as he swerved to avoid plunging into a man-sized crater. There was a tiny frisson of electricity
as their bodies touched; she jerked backwards as though she’d been hit. ‘Sorry, shit road,’ he murmured. She said nothing
but he noticed that her fingers went to the spot on her arm where they’d touched, almost as if she’d been hurt. Up ahead of
them the traffic had come to a halt. He slowed the vehicle and rolled the window down, sticking his head and shoulders out
to get a better look. A low, rumbling sound could be heard behind them, growing louder by the second.