Let's Go Swimming on Doomsday Read online

  ALSO BY NATALIE C. ANDERSON

  City of Saints & Thieves

  G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS

  an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

  375 Hudson Street

  New York, NY 10014

  Copyright © 2019 by Natalie C. Anderson.

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  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Anderson, Natalie C., author.

  Title: Let’s go swimming on doomsday / Natalie C. Anderson.

  Other titles: Let us go swimming on doomsday

  Description: New York, NY: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, [2019]

  Summary: “Forced to become a child soldier, sixteen-year-old Somali refugee Abdi must confront his painful past”—Provided by publisher.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2018023326 | ISBN 9780399547614 (hardback) | ISBN 9780399547638 (ebook)

  Subjects: | CYAC: Child soldiers—Fiction. | Refugees—Fiction. | Spies—Fiction. | Islamic fundamentalism—Fiction. | Terrorism—Fiction. | Brothers—Fiction. | Somalia—Fiction. | Kenya—Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.A528 Let 2019 | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018023326

  Ebook ISBN 9780399547638

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Version_1

  For the troublemaker of Cairo

  CONTENTS

  Also by Natalie C. Anderson

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FORTY

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

  CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

  CHAPTER SIXTY

  CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE

  Author’s Note

  Glossary

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  ONE

  THEN: OCTOBER 18, 0600 HOURS

  MOGADISHU, SOMALIA

  I float, I float, I float.

  I open my eyes and for a second they sting, and then nothing. I look around. Underneath me the floor of the ocean swells up pale and solid. Above, the sun is broken on the water’s surface into a million shining pieces.

  By now I can hold my breath for almost two minutes if I’m relaxed like this. I’ve carried a stone in from the shore, and the weight is perfect. It anchors me, and I am very still. Fish like slivers of glass sail by, too small for eating. Through the drone of water in my ears I can hear a crackling noise that my father once told me was the sound of tiny shrimp breathing. A jellyfish rides the current.

  I think I’d like to be a jellyfish. This is what it would feel like to be brainless and transparent.

  One minute and fifteen seconds. My vision is starting to pulse. I can feel my blood surging in my temples, telling me to breathe.

  I wait.

  One minute and thirty-eight seconds. Lungs burning, something animal in me screaming, Decide! Live or die!

  I look up at the shards of sun and tell it, Not yet. I want to live, of course I do, but it’s so tempting to stay. As soon as I break for air, there’s no pretending to be anything other than a boy who must swim back and put his feet on the ground. A boy who will feel his weight again, surprisingly heavy on his bones.

  For as long as I can, I resist. Two minutes and four seconds.

  I don’t want to be the boy who will walk out of the waves, water sluicing down his black arms, falling from his white fingertips. That boy will walk past the fishermen’s boats, past the fishermen. He’ll walk from the beach onto the tarmac. He’ll pass old, shattered buildings that remind him of dogs’ incisors. He’ll pass new buildings wrapped in scaffolding like ugly gifts. He’ll disappear into Somalia’s capital city, the White Pearl: Mogadishu.

  Two minutes and sixteen seconds.

  My head breaks the surface and I gasp. Air and water sting my throat.

  I tell myself I’ve chosen to live, but the water knows the truth. Waves brush my arms, soft as shroud linen.

  The water knows I have to die.

  TWO

  THEN: OCTOBER 18, 0730 HOURS

  MOGADISHU, SOMALIA

  By the time I get back to the hotel, I am completely dry.

  “Where have you been?” Commander Rashid says, closing the distance in two big strides and grabbing me by the collar. The others look at me from the floor, eyes shining in the gloom.

  “Swimming,” I say, pointing toward the water. “Just swimming, sir.”

  “Swimming?” His eyes bulge. “Swimming? What do you think this is, a holiday?”

  “I’m sorry, sir.”

  I am not sorry.

/>   He looks me over, and I can tell he’s searching for signs that I’m cracking. Or that I’m having second thoughts, or that I’ve done the unthinkable and sold him and the Boys out.

  “I needed to bathe,” I tell him. “Like a . . .” I pretend to search for the word, even though I’ve thought long and hard about what to tell him. “A purification.”

  Commander Rashid’s voice is low and soft—a knife glinting in the dark. “That was a long bath, boy. Hakim Doctor has faith in you, but if it were up to me . . .”

  He’s interrupted by Bashir jumping up from the floor. “Commander,” he says, “I apologize, but can I please have your assistance with these connections? I’m not sure if the wires go here or to the other panel.” He holds up a tangle of plastic and metal to demonstrate.

  Rashid makes a strangled noise and lets me go. “Not that one, doqon! Do you want to kill us all now?”

  The commander should know that Bashir could make a bomb out of two mangoes and a shoestring, but my friend’s ruse is lost on him. Maybe we’re all just that tightly wound right now. Bashir winks at me over the commander’s head and I creep away, slip into the adjoining room of the half-built hotel. It’s empty except for my brother, who is lying on the floor. One whole corner of the room is gone, like something has taken an enormous bite out of it. A mortar, probably. A hot breeze rummages through the rooms, but the smell coming off Khalid is still heavy and foul.

  I pick up the bottle of water and tip it into his mouth. I try not to gag. Is it the smell or my guilt that makes me want to throw up? “How are you?” I ask.

  “Fine,” he grunts, after taking barely a sip. “What do you think you’re doing, wandering off?” He’s trying to sound tough, but his voice is a rasp.

  “I just went for a last swim, that’s all.”

  “A swim? Now? Da’ud, you know there’s no time to—”

  “Shh.” It barely even registers anymore when he calls me the new name. “Hakim Doctor said you aren’t supposed to talk. The stitches will open.”

  The bandage across his stomach is a muddy red brown and needs changing, but we’re out of clean cloth. Only the Doctor would know for sure how bad the wound really is, but he’s not here. He gave Nur and Commander Rashid instructions over the phone and Nur stitched my brother up as best he could, but what Khalid really needs is a hospital, antibiotics. But he’s not getting any of that, not now that his face has been circulated across Mogadishu as a Most Wanted Jihadi.

  Whether he lives or dies is all in God’s hands now, according to the Doctor. I get it: I know what would happen if we took him to the hospital. The doctors would turn him in for the money. I know that. But doing nothing is making me crazy. I try not to think what my mother would say if she saw me just sitting here watching him die.

  If she knew that this was all my fault.

  The soldier’s bullet didn’t hit where it was supposed to. Instead it sliced right through him, just under his ribs, tearing through his intestines, from the smell of it. “Septic,” I heard one of the guys whisper when he thought I couldn’t hear. I’m not sure if the shot really was an accident or intentional, but either way, looking at Khalid sweeps away all my remaining doubts about what I’m about to do.

  My brother gurgles when he breathes, and his skin is the color of old canjeero bread. I pour a little water on a rag and wipe his face. He’s burning up.

  “When do you leave?” Khalid asks.

  “A couple of hours.”

  He nods. It looks painful. He closes his eyes. “It should be me there, not you.”

  “You should be here. Getting well, Inshallah.”

  “I don’t want to be well,” he says very softly. His eyes stay closed. “It wasn’t supposed to happen this way.”

  I don’t answer for a few seconds. I’m not sure which part he’s talking about, but it doesn’t matter. He’s right. None of it should have gone down like this.

  I’m going to fix it, I want to tell him. I’m going to fix everything.

  But I don’t say that. Straining for sincerity, I say what I know will make him feel better. “It was God’s will.” I must be a good enough liar, or Khalid’s a good enough believer. The crease in his brow smooths.

  “God’s will,” he agrees.

  I squeeze his shoulder gently, but I think he’s already asleep again. I wait until his breathing is regular. For a moment, he is Dahir again, just my big brother. Khalid the warrior fades away.

  “Please, God . . .” I trail off. It’s all the prayer I can manage.

  I stand and go to the others.

  Commander Rashid is waiting for me. The thing he carries is bulky and awkward. Wires spring from it like insect legs. The commander’s mouth is a narrow, angry slash. He’s still watching me, still suspicious. But the Doctor has given his orders, and the commander will follow them.

  He places it carefully in my arms and steps back. “Let’s see if it fits.”

  THREE

  NOW: NOVEMBER 4

  SANGUI CITY, KENYA

  “So . . .” the social worker says as she checks her papers, “. . . Abdiweli. How exactly did you end up here?”

  The sinking sun through the bars on the window doesn’t show much of the police holding cell I’ve been dumped in. Not much you’d want to see anyway. The walls are unpainted concrete blocks, and the corners are furry with grime. There’s an army cot with a suspicious brown stain, and a bucket, which, from the smell of it, is where I’m supposed to relieve myself. Geckos cling to the wall and lick their eyeballs.

  The woman watches me with sharp blue eyes. She told me her full name, but it was just a long jumble of syllables. I must have looked confused, because then she said, “Just call me Sam.” Which I think is a boy’s name, but I don’t ask. She’s from the UN refugee agency, and she says she’s here to help, but I’m not sure what that means. I’m still handcuffed to a table leg.

  Sam frowns. “Do you need an interpreter?”

  I shake my head and pick at a scab. The table between us is decorated with years of prisoner graffiti. Initials, verses from the Bible and the Koran, variations on “fuck the police,” penises. I wonder how the prisoners did it. With their fingernails? It’s not like anyone let them have knives.

  The social worker begins to stand. “I think you might. Let me just see if I can call Sayid . . .”

  “No, Madam Sam,” I say, the words coming out rusty but clear. “I speak English. I understand you.”

  She lowers herself slowly back into her chair. She’s as white as a plucked chicken except for her nose, which is red. On her wrist a beaded Maasai bracelet announces “KENYA.” Maybe she forgets where she is sometimes and has to remind herself.

  “So tell me. What’s your side of the story?”

  I shift in my chair, tugging my too-short sleeve over the knobby bones of my wrist, like I can hide my hand. The stumps where my fingers once were are pulsing again, and under the grubby bandage I know the skin is angry, stretched tight against ugly black scabs. The whole mess is taking way too long to heal. It’s hot and it’s itchy—God, is it itchy. The handcuffs aren’t helping.

  “I couldn’t pay.”

  The police wanted a five-thousand-shilling “fee” to set me free. I must have pissed one of them off when I asked if they were stupid or just crazy, because I’ve been locked to this table for at least six hours. I wonder if the UN has to pay “fees” to get me out of here.

  Sam’s eyebrows pinch. “I’m not talking about that.”

  I shrug. “They told you why.”

  “I want to hear your side. I’m trying to get you out of here.” Lowering her voice, she leans forward. Her loose brown hair sways into her face. “You’re lucky they even called us. You know how they’re treating Somali boys these days.”

  I have been shifting, turning my good ear toward her without even realizing it. Does sh
e know something? Why did the UN send a white American lady, not a Kenyan? Is she really from the UN? A shiver crawls up my spine. This is a trick. She’s trying to get me to slip up and say something.

  After a long silence Sam says, “They tried calling your uncle first, but the line was disconnected.”

  My mind goes blank. Uncle? Then I remember. That’s right, that’s what I told the police when they brought me in, that I stay with my uncle. I gave them his real name but a phony number.

  “Where is he?”

  My uncle Sharmarke died when I was ten. “I don’t know.” I scratch at the scab again.

  It’s getting late in the day. All the good sleeping spots are going to be taken in the alley behind Kenyatta Street if I don’t get out of here soon. If I get out. Would sleeping in jail really be so bad? It couldn’t be any worse than the street. I resist the urge to lay my head on the table and ignore Sam until she goes away. Instead I say, “Maybe Uncle Sharmarke is at work.” Or dead. Probably dead.

  “Do you have a different number? I can call him right now.”

  I don’t answer.

  “Don’t you want to go home?”

  I’ve come to realize that with most adults, if I just don’t say anything, usually they give up. Eventually, I am rewarded with a sigh. “Did you steal that mobile phone?”

  I shake my head no.

  “The policeman says you did.”

  I don’t try to set her straight. What’s the point? His word against mine. Guess who wins that argument. The first I heard of a stolen phone was when the officer grabbed me. Never mind that all they found in my pockets was a ratty wallet, empty except for a single business card that I can’t bring myself to throw away. No phone. But what am I supposed to say? I thought I saw one of the Boys walking down the street and freaked out? When I ran, the shopkeeper must have thought it was because I’d stolen something. He shouted for the cops. Cops grabbed me. And here I am.

  Sam sighs. “Come on, kid, throw me a bone. You need to tell me whether you took it or not, so I can get you out of here. This will all be a lot easier if I know the truth. Being a thief is better than being a . . .” She stops herself. But I know what she was going to say. It’s on the lips of everyone in Sangui City: