In the Sea There Are Crocodiles - Fabio Geda [34]
As I passed him, the old man looked me straight in the eyes, as if to tell me something. But I didn’t know what.
By night we walked.
By day we slept. Or tried to.
At the end of the third day, because the trafficker back in Teheran, our cousin’s friend, had told us the journey would last three days and three nights, we wanted to know how much longer it would be before we got to the top of the mountain—to us it still seemed to be as far as ever—and started descending toward Turkey, but we were all too scared to ask any questions, so we drew lots, and I was the one picked out.
I approached one of the smugglers and said, Agha, please, how long is it before we get to the top of the mountain?
Without looking at me, he replied, A few hours.
I went back to my friends and said, A few hours.
We walked until just before dawn, then stopped. The muscles of our legs were as hard as concrete.
At sunset, as usual, we set off again.
He lied to you, said Farid.
I already realized that, I said, thanks. But your cousin wasn’t very accurate either when he told us how long it would take.
You have to ask someone else.
After half an hour I approached another of the Iranians, who had a Kalashnikov across his shoulder. Agha, please, I said, falling into step beside him, how long is it before we get to the top of the mountain?
Not long, he replied, without even looking at me.
What does “not long” mean, agha?
Before dawn.
I went back to my friends and said, It won’t be long, if we keep up a good pace we’ll get there before dawn.
They all smiled, but nobody said anything. Any strength we might have had to speak had drained out of us through our feet and our noses and hung in the clouds of steam that materialized in front of our lips. We trudged on until the sun came up over in the direction of Nava, my home. The top of the mountain was there, one step away, so close we could reach it with one bound. We circled it. It didn’t move. We rested. When the rays of the sun lit up its jagged ridges, which looked like a dead man’s spine, the whole group stopped. We all looked for a rock to put our heads under, to keep them in the shade and sleep a few hours. Our legs and feet we left in the sun, to warm and dry them. It was so hot it tore our skin off, but what the hell?
At sunset they made us get up and we set off again. It was the fifth night.
Agha, please, how long is it before we get to the top of the mountain?
A couple of hours, he replied without looking at me.
I joined the group.
What did he say?
Nothing. Shut up and walk.
We Afghans were the youngest, the most used to stones and heights, the blazing sun, the freezing snow. But this mountain was endless, a maze. The peak was always there, but we never seemed to reach it. Ten days and ten nights dripped away, one after the other, like water dripping from a stalactite.
Early one morning—it was dark and we were clambering over the rocks on our hands and knees—a Bengali boy got into difficulty. I don’t know what it was, maybe a breathing problem, or maybe his heart, but he fell and slid down over the snow for several meters. We started yelling, Wait, someone’s dying here, we have to stop and help him, but the traffickers (there were five of them) fired in the air with their Kalashnikovs.
Anyone who doesn’t start walking again immediately stays here forever, they said.
We tried to help the young Bengali, to take him by the arms and under the armpits, to help him up and get him to walk, but it was too much for us. He was too heavy, we were too tired, too everything. It wasn’t possible. We abandoned him. As we rounded a bend, I could still hear his voice for a moment. Then it faded completely, swallowed by the wind.
On the fifteenth day there was a knife fight between a Kurd and a Pakistani. I don’t know what