Brendan DuBois - Final Winter

‘Yes, mama, you are right. When the sirens sound, I will run as quick as the wind, to the shelter. And I will find you there.’

Father grumbled some more and went back to his papers. Mama smiled sweetly up at her daughter and the ache of guilt returned, that she had not told them about Hassan. But perhaps she would tell them tomorrow. Yes, perhaps tomorrow. She came over and kissed papa on the head and mama on her cheek, and mama said, ‘Wait, daughter, just for a moment.’

Mama’s strong fingers went to Aliyah’s neck, pulling at a thin chain that hung there. Mama smiled widely as she pulled the chain free and the crucifix was exposed. She tugged again and Aliyah lowered herself, allowing her mother to kiss the form of Jesus upon the cross.

‘There. I feel better. God and His Son will protect you. Now. Go and have your fun, daughter. But if the sirens sound…’

‘Yes, yes, I know,’ Aliyah called out, racing to the door. ‘I will run right to the shelter!’

Then papa said something else, which she did not hear, and to which she paid little attention.

There would always be another time.

Out on the streets, a scarf about her head, Aliyah walked quickly down the block, sniffing in distaste at the smell of burning garbage. Ever since the war had come to Baghdad, the trash services had faltered and failed, and electricity was spotty some days and nights. But she and her family were lucky, at least, that the water was still running. There was a rumor that a cousin of Himself lived just two blocks away, and that there would be no way that he would allow the water to be stopped.

She passed parked cars and there, up on the left and on the other side of the street, was a three-story apartment building with its windows blown out, the concrete scarred by shrapnel, the large extended family who had lived in there either dead or wounded. The newspapers had said that the place had been struck by an American bomb, by a terror pilot who only wanted to strike fear into the hearts of the Baghdad civilians, and Aliyah last week had asked papa if that was true, that it had been an American bomb. Papa had shaken his head and said, ‘Daughter, you see how much artillery and missiles our brave forces fire up into the sky, do you not? Have you forgotten that old rhyme, what goes up, must come down?’ And mama had shushed him and that had been that.

Aliyah reached into her blouse, touched the comforting pendant of Jesus on the cross. She and her family were Christians, and mama and papa were proud that here, in Baghdad, still the most civilized city in the Arab world, they were allowed to worship freely. Not like the barbarians in Egypt, who murdered their Coptic Christians, or the desert barbarians in Saudi Arabia, who allowed no other religion into their kingdom. ‘We have many problems, Aliyah,’ her father had once said, ‘but being able to worship our own way is not one of them. Even Himself has a Christian as his foreign minister!’

Which was true, though it concerned Aliyah not one bit. Some foreign minister, to allow such a war to go on…but she kept such thoughts to herself. The only thought she had right now was to ensure that Hassan was going to be where he’d said he would be.

She approached the corner of the street, hesitated for a moment. She had told papa and mama that her walk would only take her to the end of the block. But it was such a cool, beautiful evening, and Hassan was only two more blocks away — what difference would it make? She hesitated again, thinking of papa and mama back home, and how easy it would be to turn around, walk back home, and stay in the living room with mama and papa, and perhaps mama would play some of her French music records, the women with such low and smooth voices, perhaps she should go back, back to where she belonged…

But the streets ahead beckoned to her. Hassan and his smile and his long fingers and his lips waited for her. Just a short stroll, that’s all, she told herself. Just a short stroll.

Aliyah walked across the street, looked back, wondering if she could see her home, but all she could make out were the low buildings of the other homes and the jagged concrete of the destroyed apartment building.

The walk went fast, and up ahead there was a small pyramid of sandbags. Men in uniforms were standing around, talking and joking, automatic rifles slung across their young backs. Aliyah slowed her walk, not wanting to look too eager, but still, she was noticed. There was laughter from two of the men, who grabbed a taller man and thrust him forward. More laughter.

She stopped in front of him, smiling widely. Hassan nodded, smiling as well.

‘Aliyah,’ he said.

‘Hassan.’

He said in a louder voice, probably for the benefit of his comrades: ‘It’s not safe to come out at night, you know that.’

‘I know…but still, I had to go for a walk. It’s so nice and cool.’

‘So it is.’

The other young men — boys, really — laughed. Hassan looked at them, smiling, and he took her hand — how strong his own hand felt — and they walked away from the pile of sandbags. They sat on a bench and watched the traffic go by, listened to the sounds of the birds, even in this part of the city, and talked about school and soccer and other gossip and, here and there, just brief comments about the war. Aliyah felt such love for Hassan, sitting there next to her in his green uniform, his assault rifle held lightly across his lap, a young boy ready to protect her and her family from the invaders. She thought about how she would tell papa and mama about Hassan, maybe tomorrow, and a thought came to her, a thought so exciting that she could feel something racing through her: Paris. Mama had said earlier that if the war was over soon enough and the sanctions were lifted, there would be enough money that when they went to Paris, she could take a friend, and mama hadn’t said whether the friend had to be a girl, and why not a boy like Hassan, from such a nice family and—

Hassan grabbed her hand, hard, as a siren began to wail.

Aliyah looked up, amazed at how dark the sky had gotten.

Oh, mama, papa, she thought, I am in so much trouble. She got up, ready to run back to their neighborhood, to the shelter, and Hassan said, ‘Where do you think you’re going?’

‘To the shelter. With my parents.’

He held on to her arm as other sirens began to wail. ‘No, it’s too dangerous. You have to stay here.’

‘Hassan, no, I—’

Hassan’s voice changed from that of a smiling young man, flirting with a beautiful young girl, to that of an armed militiaman, charged with a duty. ‘No! It’s too far! You’ll come here with us.’

He started dragging her away as his two companions joined him. They went through a narrow alleyway, past a squealing cat, and down one set of concrete steps, then another. The sirens seemed louder, and then there were two loud thuds as the evening’s bombing began. A metal door was unlatched and lights were switched on. Another, longer flight of concrete steps led to a further metal door, which was open. Hassan led the way, followed by Aliyah and the two other men. Electric lights in the shelter flickered and glowed. There was a family there, father and mother and four children, bundled together, their eyes really wide, and Aliyah wondered if she had looked so scared and innocent during the last war.

She sat next to Hassan on a metal bench and said, ‘My parents. They will be so cross with me, they told me to go to the shelter and—’

Hassan interrupted her, his voice so brave. ‘Then I will take the blame. I will say that I was on patrol when the sirens sounded, that I brought you here to keep you safe. That is what I will do.’