This Is Where I Am by Karen Campbell Read Free Book Online Page B

a wee calculation.
    ‘Do you mean is nice or is not?’
    ‘No, that’s what I was asking you.’
    ‘Yes, but is hard to . . . it is . . . not easy. This is how you say it? With the knot always?’
    ‘Do we? With a knot?’
    Maybe he’s not used to sugar.
    ‘Yes, you do. You say “is not far” when you mean is close. You say “not bad” when you mean a thing is good.’
    ‘No we don’t.’
    I see I’ve flummoxed him further with this double-negative. I shake my head.
    ‘Sorry. Doesn’t matter. Is your coffee good?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Oh. OK. Would you like some of my tea?’
    ‘No. Thank you.’
    Oh, this is awful. I have to say something.
    ‘Simon tells me you have a wee girl?’
    Immediately, he brightens. That smile again; every so often, a kindling radiance.
    ‘Yes. Rebecca.’
    ‘That’s a lovely name. What age is she?’
    ‘She is four.’
    ‘Nice age.’
    ‘Do you have children?’
    Yes no I did I was a mum and now I’m not, if I deny my baby then he didn’t exist but then he doesn’t exist and I imagine each possibility with which I can respond passing like colours through my skin.
    ‘No,’ is the answer I plump for in the end.
    ‘Ah.’
    Abdi holds my gaze that pretends to be inscrutable, but is really belligerent. Do not feel sorry for me.
    ‘You are alone then?’
    Christ . Tea, scalding the delicate puffiness of my mouth. The bluntness of his question stinging more. And he made me swear again. This is going terribly badly. I think I want to leave. I make myself swallow the bitter-hot tea. ‘I – my husband is dead, yes.’
    He says nothing. Nods.
    ‘Yup. Dead and buried at forty-nine. Isn’t life a blast?’
    The nodding stops.
    ‘Your wife?’ I figure this will be all right, since he started it. Abdi picks up his coffee cup once more, but doesn’t drink.
    ‘Apart from Rebecca, I am alone.’
    For a while, neither of us speak. We each shift our buns around their plates, mine with a neat nibble either side, his untouched. It’s very hot in here, and clattery. Echoes of metal through the kitchen hatch, the smack of trays on trolleys. And yet they’ve hung fine art on the bare brick walls.
    It is very pleasant.
    ‘Your English is good,’ I say, eventually.
    ‘I try. Is much better – I have been here almost one year. And I have no choice. No one here speaks Somali.’ Was that his tongue, peeking from between his teeth? I think it was another hint of humour, I do, and I seize on it.
    ‘Aye, but we don’t speak English here either. We speak Glaswegian.’
    A polite cough, then more crinkling round his eyes. ‘You do not speak. You –’ he makes a squawking noise, miming wings with his elbows.
    ‘True,’ I laugh. ‘We screech. So’ – and I don’t even take a breath in – ‘why did you come to Glasgow?’
    It’s not meant as a challenge, it absolutely isn’t, but his smile wipes clean.
    This is a minefield. Should I apologise, if I apologise will that make it worse? ‘If you don’t want to talk about it . . . I don’t mean . . . I don’t mean what happened, I mean – why choose Glasgow?’
    At last, he bites his bun. Speaks with crumbly enunciation. ‘I was sent here.’
    ‘Yes, but why specifically here? What made you go for Glasgow?’
    He swallows. ‘No.’
    ‘So, how – sorry. I don’t understand. Why Glasgow? Out of all the places you could have ended up? Why did you choose Scotland?’
    ‘Before I come here, I do not know there was place called Glasgow. I knew place called Yookie.’
    ‘Yookie?’
    ‘Yoo – kay.’ He says it patiently, like he is my translator. ‘But not Scotland. Not Glasgow. I do not know Glasgow until they put me on bus and brought me here.’
    ‘I see.’
    But I don’t, and I think he understands this, because he carries on.
    ‘I was in camp in Kenya for many years, then they sent me to Sudan. Then Sudan sent me back to Kenya and Kenya sent me to Yookie.’ Another bite. ‘And Yookie sent me here.’
    ‘So you’d