The Girl in the Road by Monica Byrne Page A

answer.
    Francis said something about guests being gifts from Allah. Muhammed gave him an evil look.
    He pulled me up by the elbow and walked me to a pile of grease-stained rags in the corner of the truck, just behind the cab. He sat me down on the cloths and opened a cooler and handed me a packet of glucose biscuits and a bottle of water. He told me to sit and be quiet. He pulled open a sliding door to the cab and climbed through and sat next to the driver. I could hear them talking. I was scared. I knew punishment must be coming.
    Francis whistled and then sat next to me. I cringed away.
    Easy, I’m not going to hurt you, he said. I guess you didn’t like Nouakchott too much. I don’t blame you. But now what are we going to do with you?
    I’ll live in Ethiopia, I said.
    With who? Me? he said. My life is no life for a little girl. And Muhammed already has two daughters in Hawassa.
    I can live with them, I said. I can wash their clothes.
    They have a machine for that, Francis said.
    I can cook for them, I said.
    Oh? What can you cook?
    I can make stew and mashed yams, I said. I can also milk goats and carry water.
    Francis smiled, but also looked sad.
    The cab door above us opened, and Muhammed climbed out and knelt between me and Francis. He and Francis spoke rapidly in that language I didn’t understand. I knew the punishment was about to come. But Muhammed turned to me and said something I did not expect.
    We can’t take you back, he said. We have to make Addis Ababa in three months’ time and we can’t go back now. There’s a camp for Haratine refugees outside Dakar. They’ll try to find your people through the aid groups and if they can’t, you’ll stay with them.
    You’re not going to beat me?
    He glanced at Francis. He said, No, Mariama, no one is going to beat you.
    Nothing was turning out like I expected. But then I remembered that life was different now. I remembered the moon. I remembered saha. I remembered I was free.
    I sat up straighter. What if I don’t want to stay at the camps? I said.
    Well, I didn’t want you to stay with me, but you didn’t give me a choice, did you? said Muhammed.
    Oh, leave her alone, said Francis. But the reproach hurt me and my chest felt like it was collapsing all over again, the noise kreen, kreen, kreen drowning out the saha .
    Francis patted my back. What do you want? he asked.
    I want to go to Ethiopia, I said.
    But how will you ever get back home?
    I don’t want to go back home, I said.
    Francis looked up at Muhammed and said, Something bad happened to her.
    What happened to you? Muhammed asked me.
    I looked down at my glucose biscuits, Yemaya, and didn’t answer. I didn’t want to tell them about the sky-blue snake. I didn’t know how to talk about it.
    Bad things happen to millions of children, Muhammed said to Francis. Why is this one any different?
    Because God sent us this one to take care of.
    Muhammed regarded me. Then he said something to Francis, got up, and climbed back into the cab.
    What did he say? I asked Francis.
    He told me to sleep on it.
    What language was that?
    Amharic. What we speak in Ethiopia.
    Then how do you know how to speak my language?
    I don’t, very well, he said. Just enough to rescue little girls.
    (That made me smile, Yemaya.)
    You sleep here, he said to me, indicating the pile of rags. We’ll think of something else later. I’ll sleep over there—he pointed to a crawlspace made by three crates—and if your hair is on fire, you can wake me up, but otherwise not. Okay?
    I nodded.
    He crawled away. I lay back on the pile and looked up. I could tell we were going very fast, but the stars hardly moved at all. They too whispered saha, saha, saha .

III
Meena
The Nariman Shallows
    I shove myself away from the barefoot girl, which means I slam into Lucia and our heads knock and she sits up and screams and I climb over her body to drop to the other side of