Beneath the Lion's Gaze (12 page)

“My only child is dying,” Sara said.

“Here’s the water and a towel.” Bizu climbed the stairs with slow steps. She lifted filmy, graying eyes to Emama Seble. “If you need anything else, don’t bother with Sofia, she doesn’t know where anything is. I’ll do it.”

Emama Seble squeezed a steady stream of warm water over Sara’s knees. Sara cringed as it made its way into her cuts.

“Bring the girl to me,” Emama Seble said. “If you insist on going to the church, do it tomorrow.” She spread the cloth over Sara’s legs and poured out the remaining water. “What you’ve taken must be replaced.”

“This one is mine,” Sara said. “This one, I’m keeping.”

“She’s a thread woven into a larger cloth, like all of us. If you take one, you break the others along the way. It must be fixed.” She shook her head. “I can try to help her get well. And the rest, we’ll see …”

IN THE LIVING ROOM,
Hailu was back in his chair, hunched over his radio. Yonas was next to Emama Seble on the sofa. They listened in concerned silence.

“The Education Ministry announces that the last two years of secondary school and the university will remain closed in preparation for student deployments across Ethiopia to assist in reforms. Counterrevolutionary agitators were arrested for the intent to incite riots. Haile Selassie University has been renamed Addis Ababa University. Victory to our struggling masses!
Hebrettesebawinet!
The only true means of equality, Ethiopian socialism!”

Emama Seble shook her head. “Now they’re sending all the troublemakers away? Those villagers aren’t ready for them.”

Yonas nodded. “The Derg just wants them out of its sight. Close to fifty thousand
zemechas
.”

“I’ve already made a request that Dawit stay here because of Selam,” Hailu said. “Lily’s going.”

“You have to watch him,” Emama Seble said. “Zeleka told me her
daughter
, the smart one, Sosena, not the useless one, is writing letters from America to give advice to these students. Others are sending money from everywhere. Put that pride away and start treating him like a man, respect him, he’ll listen to you then,” she said. “This sofa needs new pillows.” She shifted in her seat.

Hailu turned off the radio. “Did Sara talk to you?”

“She needs to sleep, that’s all,” the old woman replied. “I need rest myself. This shooting, how can anyone sleep at night?” She stood.

Yonas followed her. “Let me get the door.”

At the front door, she leaned towards Yonas. “You were right to help your mother,” she said. She searched his face. “Sometimes life isn’t what we should be hoping for.”

“What do you mean?” He took a step back.

“Open the door, let me go home.” Her ankle-length dress swayed as she turned. Yonas watched as a fly landed on her thick waistband and was quickly enveloped by the billowing material, disappearing against the sea of black cotton like a pebble in a dust storm.

20.

DAWIT WOKE TO
the splatter of stones against his window. He knew the signal. He crept down the corridor to the small door next to the garage. His father was still asleep, but he imagined he could hear Yonas’s voice coming from the prayer room. Two telltale creaks above his head told him Sara was awake, pacing in front of Tizita’s bed. The little girl had developed a fever the day before.

Dawit opened the door and shivered. There was a bitter chill despite the rising sun. Mickey was slumped against the wall, dressed in fatigues. He looked shorter and heavier in uniform. His cheeks were smudged with dirt and sweat and he wasn’t wearing his glasses.

“What’s wrong?” Dawit asked.

“Let me in,” Mickey said. He pushed into the house. “Did you hear the trucks go by?” He was out of breath. “Close the door!”

“What trucks?”

Mickey rushed into Dawit’s room and sank to the ground. “Did you hear them? Close the curtain.”

Dawit closed the curtain, suddenly nervous. It was rare for Mickey to be so distraught. “What’s wrong?”

Mickey blinked rapidly. “I lost my rifle and my glasses.” He moved his hand to push up invisible frames. “They’re gone.”

“Do you know where?” Dawit knew Mickey well enough to understand that he was trying to explain something else.

“He made us tie them up and drive them away and shoot them.” Mickey held his head, his voice was low, a trembling boy’s cry. “They kept asking me not to do it.”

Mickey’s face was drawn, the skin across the fleshy curves of his cheekbones seemed tighter. Dark circles gave his eyes a sunken stare, his lips were cut from biting them. His fingertips were black. Blood dotted the back of his hands. His breath smelled sour.

“Mickey?” Dawit said. “What are you talking about?”

Mickey’s hands were clasped tight around his head, squeezing so hard that Dawit was afraid he’d hurt himself. “They told me their wives’ names and how many children they had at home. We know them. They went to our school. Some were so old.” He was shaking. “Major Guddu ordered everything. He was standing next to me the whole time. They all died.”

Dawit felt his whole body engulfed in a blast of heat. He couldn’t understand what Mickey was saying. “What are you talking about?” He wiped his neck, the sweat sticky and thick. “Who’s this Major Guddu?”

“Daniel. Daniel refused. He tried to untie some of them. The major put a plastic bag over Daniel’s head and shot from inside the bag. He said the revolution didn’t waste uniforms. My uniform was so bloody the major made me put on Daniel’s uniform.” Mickey’s words were strangled between coughs. “Look how dirty it is.”

“Who died?” Dawit couldn’t say “killed.” “Mickey?”

“He was so brave, he didn’t say anything. He knelt and prayed for forgiveness. He was my friend.”

Dawit stumbled to his bed. The sweat was drying quickly, replaced by a chill. “Who were the prisoners?” he asked. “Do you know any names? We’ve been petitioning to have some of them released, there weren’t any formal charges—”

“I killed them myself. Can’t you hear me?” Mickey wiped his eyes impatiently, roughly. “He made me. He put the plastic bag over me and told me to shoot.” He touched his hair, and that’s when Dawit noticed the flecks of dried blood on his forehead. “They didn’t want to die. They moved so much. The rope kept cutting them. It was too tight.”

“Who?”

“The emperor’s grandson,
Lij
Iskinder Desta. Prime Minister Aklilu, Prime Minister Endalkachew. The other officials. Even …” Mickey grimaced and choked on his words. He dropped his head and rocked back and forth. “Even other people.”

These were the men who’d once ruled Ethiopia with the emperor, graduates of Harar Military Academy, Oxford, the London School of Economics, the Sorbonne, and Harvard, dignitaries to European nations, speakers at United Nations forums, proud warriors in the fight with Italy.

“Are you sure?” Dawit hugged his friend, but a fracture as thin as a strand of hair had snuck between them, separating him from the full sorrow he should have been feeling. Mickey’s sweat was odorous, sharp, mixed with another strong scent. Dawit turned his head. “How did you get here?”

“I jumped out of the back of the truck. I dropped my rifle. It was too hot to hold. He made me shoot so much.” Mickey reached into his shirt. “I still have this.” He pulled out a pistol, holding it flat in his palm as if it was soiled. “There are no more bullets.”

Dawit took the pistol and, unsure what to do with it, shoved it quickly under his bed. He noticed, for the first time, how yellow the whites of his eyes were, how small and darting his pupils.

“How could this happen?” Dawit asked.

“I’m telling you what happened. You think I’m lying? Look under my nails, look!” Mickey shoved his hands into Dawit’s face. Underneath his fingernails were dark threads of dried blood. “Don’t you smell their shit on me? The bag was over my face, it was hard to breathe.”

Sweat stains trailed down Mickey’s back and under his arms. Dawit smelled the bite of urine and saw a wet patch on the floor.

“Get up, wash here before going home.” He patted his back, a limp gesture. Mickey had become enemy and victim all in one night.

“I know what you’re thinking. They were so scared. They begged so much, they were going to give us everything, all their money. I couldn’t hold my rifle long, it was burning my hands, the metal was so hot it kept jamming. He kept saying the Russians would have to give us new guns now. He kept saying you can’t have a revolution without uniforms and new guns and all the traitors and cowards must be killed. I’m a coward, I’m the one he’s talking about.”

“I’ll get the bath ready. Take off that uniform.” Dawit handed Mickey a robe to put on.

“I’m a coward,” Mickey said.

“You didn’t have a choice.” Dawit rubbed his shoulders. “Take off the uniform.” He held him tight and felt Mickey’s heart beating fast against his chest. “You couldn’t say no.”

“Promise me you won’t tell anyone.” Mickey stepped away from his embrace. “Promise me, as a brother.” His nearsighted eyes narrowed.
He
’d stopped blinking and his hands were still. “And we’ll never talk about this again.

“Say it!” Mickey shouted.

“Be quiet. Tizzie’s sick,” Dawit said. It was his turn to take a step away from Mickey, the two of them suddenly felt too close. “I promise we’ll never talk about this again.”

Mickey dropped his head. “What do I do with the messages for their children? What do I do with them? We know some of them. What do I tell them?”

Shaken, Dawit walked out of the room, into the bathroom to run the water for his friend.

21.

SARA LAY NEXT
to Yonas, suffocating in the wordless space that had grown between them in the days since Tizita’s fall and her escalating fever. Their bed felt too small. Yonas’s breathing sounded too loud. The room was too hot. And in this oppressive dark, her anger stirred. They hadn’t spoken to each other since Emama Seble’s visit, hadn’t touched in over a week. She bit her lip to keep from calling his name. He wasn’t sleeping, she could feel his mind racing, could sense the tension in his body.

“You can move as far away as you want, but I’m still her father,” he said suddenly. “You can’t change that.”

“I’m not trying to,” she said.

“You are.” He was flat on his back, speaking to the air above him, refusing to look at her. “What you don’t like, you try to change. You don’t want to share this child but she’s mine, too, just like the others.”

Sara wanted to remind him it was her body that held two dying babies. Her stomach that felt like it was splitting into pieces. Her blood that flowed. Not his.

“I know that,” she said.

Yonas shut his eyes. He couldn’t argue with her when she stared at him. Her eyes reminded him of all the reasons he loved her. “What about my mother?”

“Emaye?” Sara asked.

“Didn’t she take care of you after your pregnancies? Didn’t she cook special foods and take you to visit your parents’ graves?” he asked.

His hand was tracing her back with a pressure that made her want to scream. She sat up. “I don’t understand why you’re asking.”

“You’ve been so focused on yourself, you don’t ask about her anymore. You haven’t gone to visit her. You’re selfish with our daughter.” He stressed the word “our.” “You think you’re the only one suffering,
when
there’s me and Abbaye and Dawit. You never ask how I am. Never.”

She counted the small cracks that branched from the peeling white paint on the ceiling, illuminated by a soft gray moon.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said, listening for cries from Tizita.

“You don’t think I love my daughter? I don’t want to lose her.” Yonas was getting louder. He sat up to meet her gaze. “Half her blood is mine.”

“Don’t talk to me about losing someone,” Sara said, letting her anger breathe and grow. She moved farther away from him.

“Why?” Yonas pressed. “Tell me why I can’t talk to you about it.”

“What do you know about losing anyone? You’ve had such an easy life that when something happens, you collapse like a child and start praying.” She spat out the words.

“Tell me this, since you don’t lie,” she continued.

She leaned closer to his face. Her features were tight, sharpened like stone, her eyes flat and cold. Her light skin was flushed.

“Are you praying for your mother to live?” She gave him no room to escape her gaze. “I hear you. Only an ignorant person wishes for their mother’s death. If you knew about losing someone, you’d do everything to avoid it. You’d never pray for it. You’d rather die than feel it again. How could you do that?”

“I’ve never prayed for my mother to die.” He spoke in a calm voice. “I’ve prayed for what she needs.”

Though they were in this room, in their marriage bed, together under the same moon, Yonas suddenly felt as if he’d walked away, as if he’d already stood up and gone out the door, and left behind everything these four walls contained. He no longer knew this woman, and maybe that meant he no longer loved her.

“You pray for Emaye, your own mother, to die without pain,” Sara said. “I’ve heard you.” Then, so softly that Yonas almost didn’t hear, she said, “Is that what you’ve been praying for my daughter?”

Yonas swung his right hand. Sara’s mouth was still open when his palm connected with the side of her face. The blow was hard. Its momentum threw her against the wall with a thud.

Sara charged at him. Yonas stumbled backwards, dazed, startled as much by her ferocity as by what he’d just done. Never had he raised a hand to Sara.

“What is wrong with you?” She hit, hands swinging accurately, without mercy, kept on hitting, couldn’t seem to still her rage. She attacked with her fists. She aimed for his face, his head, his neck, wherever she could find tender flesh.

“What have you done?” Tears spilled down her face. Her lips trembled. “You don’t think I’ll fight back? You forget I’m my mother’s daughter?”

Yonas ducked, shielded his eyes from her blows, but did nothing else.

Finally out of breath, Sara stepped back, her body tightly coiled. “You don’t know me.”

Yonas stepped towards her. She raised her chin, a red welt already evident near her jaw. She didn’t flinch. He stood so close she could hear the wheeze at the end of each breath. She resisted the urge to rub his chest and kiss it. He took her in his arms and held her close; her own arms were pressed stiffly to her side. He rocked gently and Sara felt the soft brush of lips on her head. He was praying. Then he turned and left the room.