Odd Child Out Page 7

  “No. I want you to find out what happened to my son. Something happened. To be out at night, without us, in some industrial place, I can’t tell you how far from normal that is for Noah.”

  Now that she’s got her emotions under control, she’s sounding steely.

  “Perhaps you could start by telling us what happened yesterday evening, before the boys snuck out?”

  She describes the party they went to at her husband’s gallery, and how she brought the boys home at about ten thirty. As she talks, fatigue drips steadily into her voice, dulling it incrementally. Her final words sound beaten. Her skin looks an unhealthy shade of yellow under the lights.

  “It was a special night. I wanted it to be a night that was just for family, but Noah asked us if Abdi could come to the party and for a sleepover afterward, and we felt we couldn’t refuse.”

  “Was it common for Abdi to sleep over?”

  “Not common, but they’d done it before once or twice.”

  “Had the boys got into mischief before on sleepovers? Snuck out of the house or anything like that?” I’m pretty sure I know the answer to this already, but I have to ask.

  “Never, that I’m aware of. Noah wouldn’t do that. I just can’t imagine it. He’s never been that kind of boy.”

  “Did he and Abdi have a good friendship?”

  She pauses before answering and picks at the edge of the plastic lid on her cup.

  “Yes.”

  “But you have reservations?” It’s not rocket science. Her response was uncertain at best. This is the first inkling I get that Fiona Sadler’s view of this friendship might deviate from the Mahad family’s. It quickens my interest.

  “Look, Detective, can I be frank? This is just a feeling and I’ve got no real basis for it, but I always thought this friendship would end up being bad for Noah.”

  “Can you tell me why?”

  “I don’t really know. A feeling? Intuition? Call it whatever you like. And I probably shouldn’t even say it at all because I expect it’s not fair to Abdi, but that’s my view. Ed will tell you that Abdi’s a charming boy, which he is, so maybe I’m being overprotective. Noah’s illness distorts things.”

  “I understand.”

  “Do you?”

  I look away from her gaze, because there’s a new edge to her now, and it’s hostile. In my experience, a mother doubted can be a ferocious adversary, and I don’t want to make an enemy of this one. Not unless I have to.

  “I try to,” I reply.

  My response softens her just enough. Her eyes flicker across mine, as if she’s searching for signs of sincerity. She nods.

  “Ed strongly encouraged the friendship, and Noah always wants to please him. He worships Ed. His dad’s a hero to him.”

  She says this as if it’s not always a good thing. For a moment I think we’re done, that she’s going to get up and walk away, back to her son, but I’m wrong. Instead, she opens up:

  “What you have to understand about my husband is that he works with people in some of the most terrible situations you can imagine. And in some of the most terrible places. He brings that home with him, Detective, that compassion, or hunger for danger, or whatever the thing is that drives him. So when Noah met Abdi Mahad, Ed was delighted, and he encouraged the friendship. He’s worked in all sorts of places, but he’s particularly interested in Somalia and the camps, so it was the icing on the cake when he found out that Abdi’s family had come here via one of the camps he’d visited. Of course he wanted them to be friends after that. Is it a good friendship? I don’t know. Maybe, but I can’t deny it makes me anxious. I suppose I want, wanted, Noah to feel free to make his own friends, not hang out with people because they fit into his father’s agenda. But, you know, it’s irrelevant now, all of it, and Ed’s going to have to stop taking responsibility for every misery that’s out there in the world, and focus on his own family instead. Perhaps we’re finally miserable enough for him to take a bit of bloody notice.”

  Her voice is raised by the time she’s finished her speech. One of the nurses hesitates beside us, but Fiona waves her on.

  “Sorry,” she says.

  “Please don’t be. You’ve got nothing to apologize for. Can I ask, do you know if there’s been any friction between the boys lately?”

  “Not that I’m aware of, though Noah talks to me less these days. He doesn’t share everything like he used to. He’s fifteen, so I suppose it’s inevitable, no matter what we’ve been through together.”

  She gestures at the space around us, and I think I get what she means: the four walls, the tacky, dated, wipe-clean hospital decor, the drugs, the equipment, the swift footfalls and professionally friendly chatter of the doctors and nurses. It’s the hospital as a machine, and one that she and her family have been cogs in for a very long time.

  “Can I ask how the boys were during the evening? How they seemed to get on together?”

  “Great, from what I saw, though I didn’t have my eye on them all night, because it was a party. I suppose that makes everything I’ve said up until now sound stupid, doesn’t it, but I can’t deny they seemed to have a good time. Noah’s coped far better than Ed or me since we heard his prognosis. What I will say, though, is that if they hatched a plan to sneak out together in advance, I can guarantee you that Abdi was responsible for that. Noah wouldn’t know where to start.”

  “Do you have a relationship with Abdi’s family?”

  “Ed tried, but really we only ever see the sister and she’s very shy or reserved or something. She always looks as if she can’t get away quickly enough. Abdi’s father drives a taxi, so he works all hours, and the mother doesn’t even speak English.”

  “Would you be happy for us to take a look at Noah’s computer and any other devices he might have? It could help us to see what his communications have been recently.”

  “Do you really need to?”

  “It might help.”

  “Then okay, I suppose. It feels like an invasion of his privacy, though, I will say that.”

  “At this point it’s something we would only do if you’re happy about it.”

  “It’s fine. Ed will be at the house for a couple of hours. You’ve only just missed him, he’s popped home to get changed and get some rest. You can collect the computer while he’s there if you want.”

  I’ll certainly be heading over there to interview him. The computer will have to be collected separately, to preserve the chain of evidence. I want everything done by the book.

  “I’d like to know if Noah’s ever spoken about Feeder Canal or visited the area he was found in.”

  “I don’t think he knows it exists. His world is home, hospital, and school. That’s why I think them going there has to be Abdi’s doing.”

  One of the nurses puts her head around the doors that lead into the ward. “Mrs. Sadler,” she says. Fiona Sadler’s head snaps around to face her. “The doctor’s ready to speak to you.”

  “Please, go,” I say. “Thank you for your time.”

  Her takeout cup rolls across the floor in her wake, small dribbles of coffee trailing it.

  Woodley and I find the elevators and wait beside a wall of grubby plate glass that gives us a view of the city center. The sky is thick with rain-heavy clouds and the streets are busy. Seagulls hover against the dark gray horizon. The contrast with the artificial brightness and quiet of the intensive care unit is a relief.

  “Some mixed messages, back there,” Woodley says. I can see his face partially reflected in the glass.

  “She’s out of her mind with grief.”

  “You would be, wouldn’t you?”

  I nod. I watch as the people on the street below begin to put up umbrellas and rain splatters against the window like hail.

  On the way down in the elevator, we’re joined by a man in scrubs with a thousand-yard stare, a packet of cigarettes and a lighter in his hand.

  Sometimes it’s hard not to let other people’s misery seep into your
own bones.

  One thing I do know is that Noah Sadler’s situation will complicate the case. He’s not just any kid who’s gone out for larks or a bit of petty crime that’s gone terribly wrong. He’s a teenager who’s terminally ill. If nothing else, the cynic in me recognizes that this fact makes the case very newsworthy. The cancer automatically labels Noah Sadler a victim, and I want to make sure that doesn’t condemn his best friend without a fair examination of the evidence.

  “We need Abdi Mahad to speak,” I say.

  Discreetly, in the corner of the bus where she’s tucked herself to minimize contact with the other passengers, Sofia thinks about the papers relating to Hartisheik camp that she saw in Ed Sadler’s office, and wonders why they were out. It’s a coincidence that’s hard to ignore. Abdi’s interest in their family’s life before he was born has been growing recently, so she wonders if he was questioning Mr. Sadler, asking things that he might not want to ask at home for fear of upsetting her or their parents.

  To distract herself, she gets the iPad out of Abdi’s bag and clicks the home button.

  It asks for a password. Sofia takes a gamble. She knows the password for the school laptop that Abdi has borrowed in the past is Medes followed by the academic year, so she tries that. It opens, but the battery is so dead that it won’t do anything else. She rummages in Abdi’s bag and finds a cable. She’ll charge it when she gets home.

  She pulls out the papers that she scooped up and flicks through them. It’s hard to look at them properly on the bus, though, because they slip around on her knees.

  She admires her brother’s perfect cursive handwriting, but from what she can see, the papers tell her nothing interesting. It’s just school stuff, a chemistry project so far as she can tell. She stuffs them back into the bag.

  She looks out the window of the bus and thinks about the life she has in Bristol. She doesn’t usually dwell on her circumstances, preferring to get on with her studies and her life, but the last twenty-four hours has thrown things into focus.

  Sofia’s generally a happy person. She knows that her family have none of the material advantages that a family like the Sadlers have, but she doesn’t mind, because she feels loved, and she remembers what true hardship felt like.

  She understands why some of her peers feel conflicted about their immigrant identity—neither fully British nor fully Somali, but somewhere in between—but Sofia’s hard work at school and university has rewarded her richly, and she draws huge amounts of focus and strength from that. On a good day, she creates her identity from these positives. On a bad day, she lets her fear of being a target of hatred mute her actions and tear at the edges of her confidence, and this is a bad day. She wonders if she’s been complacent. Perhaps she should have listened to her fears more, instead of letting others reassure her. Perhaps it’s not possible to just get your head down and start a new life here in the way she and her family thought it was. Perhaps even if you do everything right, it can all go horribly wrong.

  A text pings through on her phone. It’s from her dad. There’s no change in Abdi, it says. It asks her what time she’s getting home and if she can collect some milk on the way.

  In the shop, Mrs. Khan’s busy monitoring three schoolboys who are cruising the aisles, looking shifty. Sofia recognizes one of them as a friend of Abdi’s from primary school. She grabs some milk and heads out, grateful on this night to avoid small talk with Mrs. Khan.

  She has no such luck as she rounds the corner on the way home. Filling the pavement is Amina.

  “Sofia!” Being enveloped in Amina’s arms provides a sensation of total immersion in fabric and fragrance. Sofia loves Amina and thinks of her as a loosened-up version of her own mother. She wishes that Maryam would dress like Amina does: in beautiful colors and silky turbans instead of the dowdy robes and heavy headscarves that Maryam refuses to shed. She would love to see her mother in a bright lipstick, with a dab of color on her fine cheekbones. She would like her mother to smile more.

  The only thing Sofia doesn’t enjoy about Amina is the mandatory visual and physical examination that she’s never worked out how to avoid. Amina looks her over and squeezes her upper arm, as if testing it for ripeness, then delivers her verdict.

  “Your color’s bad.”

  “I’m tired.”

  “You need vitamins. Did I tell you I got a NutriBullet?”

  “You did.” About ten times already, Sofia thinks, but she doesn’t say it because she believes that Amina is about as warmhearted a person as you could hope to meet.

  “First your mama is unwell, and now you!”

  Sofia freezes, wondering what Amina knows, why she says that. Even though Amina’s a family friend, Sofia knows her parents wouldn’t want other people to know about what’s happened to Abdi, not unless they had to. The shame of it would be an extra blow to the family.

  “Mum hasn’t been unwell,” she says.

  “Didn’t she tell you what happened? She fainted on Friday evening, at the Welcome Center. Completely collapsed when we were serving the food. One minute, ladling pasta, the next minute, down. She would have hurt herself but chef caught her.”

  “She didn’t tell me.”

  “I expect she didn’t want to worry you. Naughty! I told her she needs to look after herself. I would have brought her home myself, but Abdi said he would make sure she was okay.”

  “Abdi was with her?”

  “Yes, darling. It was last Friday. Don’t tell me they didn’t tell you about it.”

  Amina’s frown is fearsome. Sofia thinks back. She’s been so hard at work on her coursework that she hasn’t paid much attention to the comings and goings of the rest of her family recently. Her brain feels addled, so she lies.

  “No, they did tell me. Sorry. But Mum’s fine now.” It also occurs to Sofia that Amina might want to come and visit if she thinks Maryam’s unwell, so she wants to reassure her.

  “All right, darling.” Amina regards Sofia with skepticism. She can smell a rat from a hundred yards away. “You don’t look so well yourself.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “That’s what your mother said! Okay, darling, I have to go. Take care of yourself. Tell Maryam I’ll call her.”

  Another warm hug and Sofia’s released. She thinks back to Friday as she walks on. Did her mother appear unwell that night? She doesn’t think she can remember anything unusual, but Maryam is difficult to read. Loving and affectionate one moment, shut away the next, her family have learned to live with extremes, not to question them. Maryam has been that way for as long as Sofia can remember. She’s long suspected that her mother suffers from some kind of depression, but knows that can never be voiced.

  A sense of urgency takes over as she nears home. She wants to see Abdi, to know how he is, but she braces herself in case there’s no improvement.

  In the flat, Maryam watches her daughter put the milk in the fridge. She’s trying to think of what she might be able to cook to tempt Abdi to eat, because nothing has passed his lips yet today, and she’s caught off guard when Sofia asks, “What’s the name of the camp we lived in?”

  “Hartisheik,” she says, hoping Sofia doesn’t catch her swallowing as hard as if bile had risen in her throat. “Why?”

  “I was thinking about it today, but I forgot the name.”

  Maryam can tell that her daughter’s not being truthful. She can read Sofia like a book. But the very fact that her normally earnest and honest girl is lying drains Maryam of her courage to ask why. She resists a powerful impulse to shudder, because mention of the camp, on this day, can only be a bad portent. She wishes Nur hadn’t just left the room. She needs to tell him. She wants it to be face-to-face.

  As her mind works, she continues to putter in the kitchen as if on autopilot. She makes batter for pancakes. They’re Abdi’s favorite. She’s not sure what else to do.

  As Maryam makes the mixture she endeavors to hold back memories of the camp, turning the radio on, distracting herself with mus
ic, beating the batter for far longer than she needs to. Sometimes she’s successful when she uses tactics like these; sometimes she raises blisters on her hands rather than stop and think; and sometimes nothing can hold the memories at bay.

  Sofia has noted her mum’s reaction and the way she tried to hide it, but she’s not too surprised by this, because Maryam hates to speak about their past. Sofia’s too nervous to ask about the fainting incident at the Welcome Center in case it upsets Maryam further. Perhaps she’ll mention it to her father.

  She finds Nur in Abdi’s room, sitting by the boy’s bed, gently cleaning his glasses. He puts the glasses back on and joins her in the sitting room.

  “I’ve tried to get him to talk, but no luck,” he says. “I have to go to work.”

  “I’ll try tonight,” she says.

  He kisses her on the forehead and leaves the flat before she has a chance to talk to him about the Welcome Center.

  So far as she can see there’s no change in Abdi at all. His bedroom’s gloomy and he doesn’t seem to have moved. Rather than dump his bag in there, she takes it into her own room, thinking she might get the laundry out of it and wash it for him. She doesn’t burden her mother with it. She’ll do it herself. She also takes the iPad and charger out of the bag and plugs them in in her bedroom.

  “Hartisheik,” she whispers as she does so. The word rolls itself around her mouth. She was right, then: The paperwork she saw in Ed Sadler’s office related to the camp they lived in. She wanted to hear confirmation of the name of the camp from her mother, but she didn’t want to burden Maryam with what she saw, not until she’s thought about it some more, about what it might mean.

  She has a swiftly changing kaleidoscope of memories from the camp they left when she was a little girl. She remembers the yellow jerricans that stored water, which was the most precious commodity of all in Hartisheik, and the straw mats that covered the floor of their shelter.

  All around the camp people put up their shelters in enclosures made from the branches of thornbushes woven together. The sheep had black heads. Sometimes the camp flooded and they couldn’t lie down on the ground at night. A thin red curtain hung between the living and cooking area of her family’s tukul, and she would play with its tattered edges, pulling at the threads until her mother chided her. Outside, the boys played football as the sun set, and the dust they kicked up turned golden.