The final instalment of Esha Ex, a novel-length work of new fiction, which I've been updating daily. For more details click here.
“Hi, Esha. Get up, would you?”
“Hi, Esha. Get up, would you?”
“What if I went for you right now?” I snarled, coiled on the floor.
“You’re not going to do that.” And then she actually flicked her hair, with a nonchalant swipe of her finger, out of her collar. It fell back in a smooth and bouncy wave.
I dragged myself up, seething. She indicated the place opposite her. It was impossible to fight with someone who wouldn’t fight back. All the juice went out of my muscles and I let my head go back and roll with the motion of the van. My bones were throbbing.
The inside of the van was not completely black, as my panic had made it seem. There were ventilation slots running high along the sides and cut-outs in the top surface through which the sun flashed. There were long metal benches on either side of the inside of the van, with rings and hooks set into the floor, walls and ceiling, allowing any configuration of restraints, belts, cuffs, chains, ropes, for detained individuals.
The van wasn’t speeding. I could sense a drag in its motion, a frustrated lag, as if it was being driven slower than it wanted to go. Next to Sahar some storage space had been blocked out, like a black metal locker, and she was resting her elbow casually on the top of it like a lady waiting for a friend in a café.
“Where are we going?” I asked. I was determined not to beg her not to hurt me.
“Central core.” She opened the front of the locker. Inside was a telephone. She dialled a coded number, just three digits, said into it, “We’ve got her,” and hung up.
“Who’re you calling?” I asked.
“An associate. You just met her, actually.”
“Don’t play games with me.” The van took a wide, round turn, pressing me back against the wall. “I wouldn’t think that even you were so low as to go to all this fuss for someone as minor as me.”
“We in the Family always say: a small pain in the arse will turn into a big one, the way a splinter inflames the entire limb.”
“That’s what you sit round saying to yourselves all day? Gods, you’re pathetic.”
A little smile played about Sahar’s face.
“I’m no kidnapping you, I’m saving your skin,” she said.
“Don’t taunt me, it’s disgusting.”
I heard a clanging sound rising in an arc over our heads. It was the alarm of a toll booth barrier.
“We’re on the motorway,” said Sahar. I didn’t react. I heard pushes of noise as we overtook other vehicles. Not a single one sounded their horn in protest.
“How nice it must be, in your world,” I said. “Nobody says no to you. They can tell this is a Family vehicle. I couldn’t.”
“You think it’s nice doing my job because I get to ride in the back of a military vehicle?”
“Yes, I do think that.” As we talked my gaze was skittling about, trying to find a way out. But the van was sealed tight. “What do you want?”
“To have a chat.”
“You see, this is what I hate about you people. I hate the way you talk.” Sahar opened her mouth to speak and I interrupted, “I find it hard to believe you wake up and switch on to Binar Bizarre every morning or weed through the leaked footage from the front of a mall in an inner-city block that nobody gives a shit about….”
“No, we have people to do that for us.”
“Of course you do.”
“Nasser-Khaleb Murat is Prince Raed’s uncle, by marriage,” said Sahar.
“Ha! I knew it. You people.”
“He’s his mother’s sister’s husband. And Amaro Solanki is Nasser-Khaleb Murat’s nephew – Mr Murat’s wife’s brother’s son.”
“You lot are so inbred I’m amazed your children don’t have gills and two heads.”
We cleared the toll booth. The van accelerated and carried on smoothly.
“What do you want?” I said. “The last time I went face-to- face with you – ”
“I’m sorry about that.”
“You tried to bribe me. You think I’m going to reveal Raed’s sexuality to the world. But I’m not.”
“Homosexuality is still illegal here.”
“I’m no blackmailer. And everyone knows it’s one rule for the Family, one rule for everyone else. You people do what you like.”
“It’s still a conservative country.”
“It’s a loyal one. A benign dictatorship – isn’t that how we’re seen from the outside? Famously.”
“Poverty makes people disloyal and there’s a lot of it in Miriadh. That’s why you’re risky. Miriadh has many young people in it – the majority of the population, now, are under 25.”
“The Family’s given them a good model to follow, on that score: have as many children as you physically can –”
“They know there are other ways to live. You have symbolic value.”
“From a few video clips?” I sneered.
“Those people live through their screens. Their real lives are rubbish, terrible, not exciting.”
“Get the TV companies to delete them. I’m sure you have that power.”
“We don’t censor.”
“Of course you do.”
“No. We omit things. But we don’t censor.”
“Oho! A true Mirian distinction. Why don’t you just shoot me in the back of the head and throw me in the Kader?”
“If something like that happened you’d become a martyr.”
“Only if someone wonders where I went, which they won’t.”
“They might. Mirians are sentimental. I’ve been following our progress since you left.”
“Yeah, I know you hate me.”
“The Family doesn’t ‘hate’ anyone.”
“You’re not the Family, you’re an illegitimate offshoot, bred for labour. You only serve the family, because your ancestors did. You have to – tradition dictates it.”
“I don’t hate you, I admire you.”
In the astounded silence that followed, we switched lanes and the sound outside changed. There was a stiff, buffeting noise from one side, hard air knocking about the space: we must be in the leftmost lane, the fastest one, and there was a crash barrier alongside us. If I tried anything, forced my way out through the back doors or tried somehow to break into the front and gain control of the wheel – although there seemed to be no way to do this – I would cause a fatal accident on the road.
“The man at the hospital. The guard. He works for you,” I said.
“Nope. He’s for real. They wanted to question you about the bike. Legitimately.”
“That was so much more trouble than it was worth!”
“We can make that go away.”
“So you’ve gone rogue or something?”
“No, I act at my own discretion. It’s left to me to decide what’s done with you. As you say, the Family has lots of petty irritations. Lots of splinters. They can’t deal directly with every one.”
“You planted the master key in my clothes.”
“One our agents did that. We have someone at the hospital – as we do in all institutions.”
“Lakshmi,” I said, certain.
“No, the other one.”
“The other one? Qumul! No!”
I gave an astounded laugh and even Sahar smiled.
“Yup. Qumul. Real name Ophris.”
“Ho – she’s good. She was really milking it.”
Sahar and I grinned at each other and I instantly felt the perversity of it and let the smile drop from my face.
“She’s with me on this,” said Sahar.
“She’s with you? You mean she’s a friend of yours? Or that she agrees with you?”
Sahar shrugged.
“You’re the same age as us. We keep our tabs on you – we’re impressed…”
“And I’m supposed to be flattered by that? Don’t you know how completely and utterly sick and creepy that is?”
Her eyes burned somewhat as she looked at me.
“What’s that look?” I said to her. “Don’t tell me it’s envy. Even you wouldn’t patronise me so much…”
“You go somewhere. You rile them up. You’re alone. You fight. You say what’s on your mind – ”
“Oh grow up! Now you really sound like a little, little child,” I said, squirming in my seat. “I don’t even have clothes of my own! I can’t remember the last time I ate!”
“You’re a fighter,” she said, with a patronage so raw it set my teeth on edge.
“No. I hustle to survive, moment by moment. It’s not the same thing. I’m flattered that you’re so threatened by it. I’m nothing special. That’s just your fantasy.”
“People like me, our families have always worked for the Family. We always will. We’re bonded in servitude to them,” Sahar countered.
“You have power.”
“No, I have position.”
“To me and all people like me, believe me, it’s the same thing.”
“If I left the Family I’d be blacklisted for disloyalty. I wouldn’t find a post anywhere else.”
“Not with a royal family. But with a foreign company you would,” I finished easily.
“I wouldn’t be granted an exit visa.”
“Sahar, the Family might be a golden cage but it’s still gold.”
We were each on our bench, gripping the edge, feet braced on the floor, shaking slightly with the van’s vibrations.
“You don’t rebel,” I said. “Youdon’t fight. You don’t risk anything. You sit back while people like me try, people who have nothing. If I’m thrown to the dogs, you’ll shrug and turn your attention elsewhere. We’ll never be friends.”
“I know that.”
“Raed will marry whoever’s he’s to marry and you’ll see to it that it all rolls on, exactly how it’s meant to. Whatever you may secretly feel inside.”
“Raed’s fiancée is a very promising young woman.”
“I’m sure she has very promising childbearing hips. And what about that boy - Nikko? Raed used him.”
Now Sahar showed her true Family colours.
“Nikko wanted to be there, doing that. He knew what he was getting involved in. If you play with fire you get burnt to death.”
“Raed took advantage of him.”
“Nikko’s naïve if he think he was special – how a prince behaves is how he’s always behaved. You don’t toy with the Family then expect them to give you special concessions.”
“Nikko’s in love with him.”
“We don’t live in an age of love affairs,” Sahar snorted.
“What age do we live in?”
“You tell me,” she said silkily, “since you know.”
We stared at each other for a few seconds.
“…A hard, brutal, striving age,” I said.
“Yes,” she said, and clenched her fist.
“And the others – Opal and Jacir?”
“They still work for us.”
“Are you saying they’re happy? You know what happens on workers’ floors. Those girls are prey.”
“They’re no more or less happy than they would be anywhere else. You think, because of what you’ve managed to do, that in Binar, or in wider Miriadh, anyone can do just anything and go just anywhere. They can’t. For girls like Opal and Jacir, everything else is worse,” she said.
“So, you’ll save me, one person out of billions – while all the others go to hell. For all you know, going to prison for a spell for scooter theft might straighten me out.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. No-one survives a Mirian prison. In this country we believe in punishment, not rehabilitation. But you decide. We can turn back. I’ll tell the driver.”
“Nah. I’ll take my chances. If it’s a choice between a cell and the streets.”
The van slowed but the atmosphere quickened.
“This is a game to you,” I said. “You let me out and what? I have to promise never to answer back to anyone higher up than me – which is everyone – and I’ll be okay?”
“You’re at liberty to do what you will. I can’t perfect your life for you. This is the best I can offer.”
“What are the other choices?”
“‘Questioning’ for disobedience and insurrection. Jail for petty theft. Or reform: a three year intensive programme of lessons and training, all free, accommodation and food and everything provided.”
“And then?”
“You join our security forces.”
“Gods! Never.”
The van followed a long, leisurely diagonal.
“We’re close,” she said.
She reached for something next to her. It was a package, like a double-weight of flour, tightly bound in black nylon. I hadn’t noticed it against the black of the walls. She gave it to me.
“What is it?” I asked.
“Some Basics. Money – enough to survive for a couple of weeks. Food. Some other stuff. No luxuries.”
“You’ve taken pity on me. And this is the price of your conscience: a fortnight’s rent.”
“It’s got some papers in it. New ID and bank papers. In a new name. Your record’s been wiped,” said Sahar.
“I’m not Esha Ex any more?”
She shook her head. There was a long pause, during which all my nerves tingled and I felt my old self slip away – painlessly. I would have floated away with it, but for the weight of the package in my lap.
The van made a neat turn and came to a softly buffered stop. The engine died. I didn’t move.
“We’re here,” said Sahar.
“What’re you going to do now?”
“Go back to work.”
I stood up, weighing the black package.
“An entirely new life. And this is the size of it,” I said.
I went to the doors, half-step by half-step.
“Go on,” said Sahar.
With a deep click the doors loosened, letting in the thinnest line of light.
“I hope I never see you again,” I told Sahar.
But even that concession, that one promise, she couldn’t make me.
“That depends on you,” she said.
The floor was vibrating as the ramp slithered out. The doors loosened further breaking out from their frame so a clear inch of light showed along the bottom. Sahar sprang forward and we clasped hands for a second.
“Goodbye, Esha.”
“Who’s Esha?” I grinned.
The doors opened and the light came in. Although I knew my every step was being watched, I walked free.