Little Bee - Chris Cleave [110]
“Nice,” I said.
The man tapped his finger against the side of his head.
“But that’s how you’ve got to think, these days, isn’t it? It’s the global economy.”
The plane began to roll backward on the tarmac and some television screens came down from the ceiling. They started to show us a safety film. They said what we should do if the cabin filled with smoke, and they also said where our life jackets were kept in case we landed on water. I saw that they did not show us the position to adopt in case we were deported to a country where it was likely that we would be killed because of events we had witnessed. They said there was more information on the safety card in the seat pocket in front of us.
There was a huge and terrifying roar, so loud that I thought, They have tricked us. I thought we were going on a journey, but actually we are being destroyed. But then there was a great acceleration, and everything started shaking and rising up to a terrifying angle, and suddenly all the vibration was gone and the sound died down and my stomach went crazy. The man beside me, my guard, he looked at me and laughed.
“Relax, love, we’re in the air.”
After the takeoff, the captain came on the intercom. He said it was a fine, sunny day in Abuja.
I understood that for a few hours I was not in anyone’s country. I said to myself, Look here, Little Bee—finally, you are flying. Buzz, buzz. I pressed my nose against the aeroplane window. I watched the forests and the fields and the roads with their tiny cars, all those tiny precious lives. Me, I felt that my own life was already over. From very high up in the sky, all alone, I could see the curve of the world.
And then I heard a voice, a kind and gentle voice that was familiar.
“Bee?” said the voice.
I turned from the window and saw Sarah. She was standing in the aisle and she was smiling. Charlie was holding her hand and he was smiling too. He was wearing his Batman outfit and he was grinning as if he had just killed all the baddies.
“We is in the sky, isn’t we?” he said.
“No darling,” said Sarah. “We are in the sky, aren’t we.”
I did not understand what I was seeing. Sarah reached over the guard and she put her hand on my hand.
“Lawrence found out what flight they were putting you on,” she said. “He’s not entirely bad, at the end of the day. We couldn’t let you go back alone, Bee. Could we Batman?”
Charlie shook his head. Now he looked very solemn.
“No,” he said. “Because you is our friend.”
The guard, he did not know what to do.
“I’ve seen bloody everything now,” he said.
Finally he stood up and made room for Sarah and Charlie to sit beside me. They hugged me while I cried, and the other passengers turned around in their seats to stare at this miracle, and the aeroplane flew all of us into the future at five hundred and fifty miles per hour.
After some time they brought us peanuts, and Coca-Cola in tiny cans. Charlie drank his too quickly, and the Coca-Cola came out of his nose. After Sarah cleaned him up, she turned to me.
“I did wonder why Andrew didn’t leave a note,” she said. “And then I thought about it. It wasn’t Andrew’s style. He didn’t really like to write about himself.”
I nodded.
“Anyway, he left me something better than a note.”
“What?”
Sarah smiled. “A story.”
At Abuja they opened the aeroplane doors, and heat and memory rolled in. We walked across the tarmac through the shimmering air. In the terminal building my guard signed me over to the authorities. Cheerio, he said. Best of luck, love.
The military police were waiting for me in a small room, wearing uniforms and gold-framed sunglasses. They could not arrest me because Sarah was with me. She would not leave my side. I am a British journalist, she said. Anything you do to this woman, I will report it. The military police were uncertain, so they called their commander. The commander came, in a camouflage uniform and a red