Secret Skin (31 page)

On the wall hung a grubby plastic mirror with a crack in its façade. The mirror was in better shape than I was. The toilet was the usual squat hole in the ground, left in a muddy mess of footprints and toilet paper by its previous occupant. Not that I was going to use it, I had no fluids left.

I took off my shirt and washed under my sore blistered armpits and then shoved my head under the trickle of the low pressure tap. I threw my head back and let the water run down my back and chest. I caught sight of myself in the mirror again. The covering of sand had been washed away and the water had mixed with the dried blood to create an all over red varnish.

I was so thirsty I’d forgotten to drink.

I jammed my head into the small sink and opened my mouth under the tap’s dribble of warm water. I expected it to be the most amazing thing I had ever tasted, but it was purely functional. Something that had to be done, my body almost resented the water. It had begun the slow shut down of dehydration, on its way to physical delirium and harmful happiness.

I washed the rest of the blood from my face and body, what was left underneath was colorful and ugly. The once sparkling eyes of Mother Bryson’s boy stared back, lost and emotionless.

I drank some more water and made myself as presentable as I could. I looked like a walk-on in a zombie movie. The collar of my shirt wouldn’t stay straight and the hair on the back of my head stuck up at right angles to everything else regardless of the amount of water I drowned it in.

I set out along the Hatta Road towards Dubai holding out a hopeful thumb. No one stopped.

Two Indian men, one tall, one short, stood by the edge of the tarmac waiting for a ride. They were an incongruous sight. They both carried immaculate, branded briefcases, fakes, and wore matching blue and white striped shirts. One wore black trousers the other purple. They looked in between middle-age and youth and could have been on their way to fame and fortune in the big city or returning home after losing everything.

I nodded hello and they smiled at me. Neither of them had the traditional Indian moustache. At any other time I would have asked them for their story, perhaps they had crossed the border illegally from Oman. After surviving the last 24 hours I was happy to simply sit by the side of the road and let them have first dibs on hitching rights.

Rest. But not for long. The two men were picked up almost instantly. The taller man jumped in the back of the pickup and the shorter guy pulled himself up into the cab. They both waved a friendly good bye.

Then it was my turn.

The driver looked at me in disbelief when I climbed in the passenger door of his 4x4. He didn’t say anything though. Too polite.

‘Thank you,’ I said, croaking, ‘Shukran jazelan,’ in broken Arabic.

‘Afwan,’ he said, opening the armrest to reveal four neatly stacked bottles of water. I opened one and swallowed hard, my thirst was back.

‘Shukran, shukran, shukran,’ I gasped. ‘Bitikalam Injaleezie?’ I asked and he laughed, heartily and without malice.

‘You speak Arabic?’ he said, his perfect English mocking my Arabic.

‘Schwei schwei,’ I said holding my thumb and forefinger close together, little, little. ‘I spoke some in Egypt a few years back and I’ve tried to learn here, but nobody seems to be able to agree which Arabic is the right Arabic to learn, so I gave up.’

‘That explains your peculiar accent. You should have kept at it. Any Arabic is good Arabic hey?’

‘Yes, you’re probably right.’

We sat in silence, him driving and me with my head against the window.

‘If you don’t mind me saying you look terrible.’

‘I don’t mind,’ I said and looked at him. He was perfectly groomed but not fussily so, his beard and moustache were trimmed comfortably rather than fashionably and he wore the simple square skull cap popular with Omanis rather than the headdress preferred in Dubai. He had graying sideburns and a lean healthy bearing. He drove confidently at speed with one relaxed hand on the wheel. He even had his seat belt on.

He also examined me in more detail.

‘What happened,’ he asked, ‘Were you in a car accident?’

‘Nope ‘fraid not, although it certainly feels like that.’

He had an amiable gleam in his eye. He expected something more. I breathed deeply and enjoyed the cool of air conditioning.

‘I fell for a prostitute.’

His expression was blank and non-judgmental, he gave nothing away. I needed to explain, to get it right in my own head.

‘I was writing a story about her. I’m a zahafi – a journalist. Then I broke a pedophile's nose with a fire extinguisher who happened to be a friend of her pimp; then I clumsily tried to buy the prostitute’s freedom; then the police tried to arrest me on false charges; then my editor and I were almost killed by three young men.’

His eyes widened at this point. His foot eased off the accelerator as his interest grew.

‘Someone tried to kill you?’

‘Yes, but we can’t prove it and the three men are dead now.’

‘So, this is what happened to your face?’

‘No that came later. The pedophile is a banker involved in a property scam laundering millions of dollars of dodgy money from a Russian arms dealer. The Russian killed his business partner and we caused a bit of a scene at one of their launches. The men involved beat the crap out of me. Then the police took me to a camp…somewhere out there,’ I pointed to the desert.

‘They were going to kill me I think, but first they buggered me with a cattle prod,’ I said, making a now painfully familiar hand gesture. The car swerved, the man’s eyes fixed on me with fascinated horror.

Should I be telling him any of this? I didn’t even know who he was.

‘My friend rescued me,’ I continued, ‘but then they chased me through the desert with guns. I slept the night in the desert and have been walking for the last six or seven hours…then you picked me up.’

The silence opened up between us as the man digested this, my paranoia jumped right in to the gaping void. The man saw that my hand was shaking.

‘It is okay,’ he said, ‘I am a friend, I will not hurt you.’

I nodded, but I could not stop the shaking.

‘You must hate us,’ he said.

‘Who?’

‘The Arabs,’ he said sarcastically. ‘For trying to kill you.’

‘They weren’t just Arabs,’ I said. ‘Anyway I’ve decided to hate everybody – even myself, I won’t leave anyone out that way.’

He looked at me and filled the air with laughter. I laughed with him. ‘God,’ I said, ‘I’m glad it’s not just me.’

‘It would be pointless hating the Arabs my friend.’

‘Why?’

‘There is no such thing. No more than there is such a thing as a westerner.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘A farmer from Provence, a Texan politician, a Scottish whisky maker, a Spanish butcher…we call them westerner, but there is no such thing. I probably have more in common with the Spaniard or the Texan than they do with each other.’

‘I promise not to hate anyone who doesn’t exist,’ I said jokingly.

He laughed, ‘Good. Here they call us Arabs, and then assume that all Arabs are Muslims.’

‘And that all Muslims are Arabs,’ I said, I had heard the argument once before from an academic, but never from a peninsular native.

‘Exactly. I am a Muslim and an Arab but I’m also a man, a father, a brother, a husband, a son. I am many things not just one.’

‘Why are you telling me this?’

‘Because what happened to you happens here all the time.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes. This has even happened to my family.’ It was his turn to tell a story. ‘My sister married an oaf whose father had money. But the oaf lost his wealth when his father died. He squandered it on all the latest things and spent none on his future.’

He paused to overtake a column of slow moving trucks on a massive roundabout. He didn’t slow down.

‘My nephews study, but they also work hard to provide for their parents. I dote on them and help them when I can.’

I nodded understanding. He pursed his lips.

‘Last month they went to a party at a classmate’s house, a sheikh’s house. These wealthy sons of powerful men taunted them about their poverty, humiliated them in front of everyone. My younger nephew Mohammed is a little head strong. He told these other boys that if their uncle was as big a man as they said then he would do more with the emirate’s money than make his fat lazy relatives even fatter, even lazier, and even richer.’

His laugh was hollow. His eyes were sad.

‘It is true of course but it was not the right place to say it. Words were exchanged.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You don’t offend the ruling family. Not here. Not in public.’

‘Why not? Criticism is healthy. Good things can always take criticism.’

‘Yes but here it is not so good for the critics. Mohammed went in to the desert with these “friends” two weeks ago.’ He looked at me meaningfully and then stamped the accelerator.

‘What happened?’

‘He never came back. There was no accident, no explanation. He just disappeared,’ he said controlling his anger. ‘And we…we are supposed to say nothing, to do nothing.’

I didn’t know what to say.

‘If you had not made it out of there,’ he said pointing to the desert, ‘your body would never have been found, the same as my Mohammed. You should think about leaving, you are not safe here anymore.’

‘I know.’ I said, wondering again if Martin was alive or dead. ‘It’s like the fucking mafia.’

‘Yes. Now I have to collect my other nephew Hasan, he will come back to Oman with me, but it may be too dangerous for him even there.’

‘You know we westerners can’t say anything against the rulers either.’

‘Yes we know, you get deported, or maybe you have a little accident.’ He smiled grimly.

‘According to a professor I once interviewed it’s all because of the ruling deal that the government made with its people.’

‘What is that?’

‘Once upon a time the owners of Dubai made a deal with the Muslims who lived there. ‘You stay by the creek’ they said ‘we’re just going to build a little port and a few houses for some non-Muslim foreigners as far away from you as we can. But don’t worry because we will make you rich, so if you see any funny goings on, you know cleavage and drinking, then be a good Muslim and just ignore it. Oh, and don’t ever question what we tell you to do. Why? Because your silence will make you rich.’

‘Yes, this is what happens when you give stupid people money. They use Islam as a weapon, “either do what we say or the kid gets it,”’ he said mimicking a pistol and an American accent.

I didn’t want to let my ride to safety draw me into a discussion on religion. He sensed that and carried on anyway.

‘Are you a Christian?’

‘No.’

‘What are you then?’

‘No offence but I don’t think you’d understand.’

‘Try me, or I’ll put a fatwa on yo’ ass.’ He said in perfect gangsta.

We both laughed. ‘You’re a maniac.’

‘Yes one interested in religion, not a religious maniac,’ he said tapping his nose.

‘That’s a good line.’

‘Yes so what are you?’

I thought about my answer for a moment. ‘I’m a true believer. People are always controlled by what they believe, rather than being in control of how they believe.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well, it is the act of believing that makes us powerful, not what we believe in. Chakras, religion, economics…whatever, they are just something to channel your belief. So I guess I’m a true believer, I believe nothing but I understand the power of belief.’

‘Interesting. Now you are the religious nutter hey?’

‘Probably, but show me a religious or political leader that doesn’t get their power from making people believe…whatever they want them to believe….’ I said waving my hand as I lost my line of reasoning.

We drove in silence for a few moments.

‘So what is it for Oman?’ He said.

‘Huh?

‘The ruling deal?’

‘Well your country doesn’t have so much money, there the environment must look nice, heritage must be honored, it must be beautiful to live in. That’s why you have all those trees everywhere, guys cleaning beaches every morning and that billion dollar mosque in the middle of Muscat.’

‘Hah!’ He beamed at me showing a set of surprisingly pointed teeth. ‘It is not that simple my friend, but it does make sense.’

‘It made sense to me too.’

‘So, what is the ruling deal where you are from?’

I thought about this, an obvious question to ask myself, but I never had. ‘I wish I knew.’

***

He dropped me at the DragonMart, a mall on the outskirts of town built in the shape of dragon and the home of Dubai’s Chinese vendors, where you could find the same kinds of busy stalls found throughout South East Asia.

‘You’re my hero,’ I said, hand on heart, ‘thank you for rescuing me from the side of the road. I hope your nephew is okay.’

‘Thank you, I will make sure of it. And you should think about leaving my friend,’ he said and shut the door. He waved a hand and rejoined the frantic traffic on its way downtown.

I was afraid to go home. If they thought I was alive they would be waiting for me there. But with my scruffy slept in the desert demeanor and bruised face I was too damn conspicuous. I needed to get cleaned up.

I stood on the kerb and waited for a taxi. My wallet was long gone; once again I had neither cash nor cards. Nothing apart from what I was standing in. I knew where to get some but there were other things I had to know first.

My face had been presentable enough to shove through the driver’s window and tell him where I wanted to go. He hadn’t noticed my hobo-chic until about half way through the ride and shouted at me when I told him I didn’t have any money. I made him wait outside the hotel apartment where I had first met Yasmin, it hadn’t changed.

I had assumed it was rented by the hour or by the night, but all that walking had given me time to think. It was the one place I hadn’t looked for her and I gambled that Yasmin’s set up was the same as the Ugandan girl I’d met in Deira – her workplace was also her home.