Chapter 37: Find Me on the Other Side? - My Name Is Samim

Calais, France, autumn 2021

People moved to make room for us as we climbed into the dinghy. We clutched our bags close, shivering in the biting wind. We stared at our feet, trying to ignore the sea. But the sea wouldn’t have it. It poked the boat, making it sway, and we swayed with it.

The handler hopped into the boat and passed a satellite phone to the man by the tiller. He instructed the man where to steer, switched the engine on and climbed out. A few minutes later, we were drifting away from the French coast.

I lifted my head. The lights of Calais flickered in the distance, and I caught myself wishing I’d stayed.

As the half-moon watched us glide through another sea in our last push to the end of our journey, I wondered how many hopeful souls it oversaw drowning here. And if we were all as important and needed as this moon, then why had God granted those souls such dreadful fates? Why had he taken my family away from me? Why had he let Darya die?

A woman in front of us took a towel embroidered with pomegranates out of her bag and laid it over her knees. With a pocket knife, she cut a yellow apple into thin slices and handed them to her children and the people around her.

“It’s like watching someone hang curtains in hell,” Zayn whispered, and I smiled.

We nodded off, leaning on each other’s shoulders.

* * *

Two hours later, a scream jolted me out of my dream.

“The boat is leaking! The boat is leaking!”

I looked down, and there was water over my feet.

People started shouting, and my chest flooded with terror. The last time people panicked in a dinghy, we all fell overboard.

“Calm down, everyone! I’m calling the coastguard!” the man by the tiller shouted. He pushed a few buttons on his phone and yelled desperately in English, “We are in the Channel, and we drown! Please help us! Please, show us mercy!”

The engine was still roaring, and we were moving – this gave me some hope.

Zayn took his shoes off, shoved the rest of our money in his pocket and started ladling the water out of the boat with his shoe. I followed him, and everyone else soon did the same.

As I bent over to scoop the water, I noticed I was managing it much easier than Zayn. His life jacket was in his way, whereas mine wasn’t. It was deflated!

“My life jacket!” I screamed. “It’s broken!”

Zayn grabbed me by the jacket, fumbling around. “It’s empty,” he muttered, then clasped his head.

“What do I do, Zayn? What do I do?”

Zayn scratched the back of his neck, then drew a deep breath and took his jacket off.

“You will wear mine,” he said, passing it to me.

“No! What about you?”

“I am a better swimmer than you. I can manage without one. Just take it!”

“No, Zayn, I can’t. Don’t!” I grabbed his arms, trying to stop him from unfastening my jacket.

The man’s scream made us wince. “The engine stopped! We’re sinking!”

Water was filling the boat quickly now, and although everyone was working hard to get rid of it, it was only rising.

“We have five to ten minutes at most!” the man by the tiller yelled. “Make sure your life jackets are fastened and pray the coastguards get here in time!”

Zayn pulled at my jacket. “Take it off! Take it off!” he hollered.

I took it off, put his one on, and stared at Zayn wild-eyed.

“I’ll be okay.” He exhaled. “I’ll be okay.” His voice was calmer now.

I gulped.

Mothers clutched their children, husbands held their wives, and I hugged Zayn. My brother’s heart was next to mine, and I prayed for one thing only: Please, God, let our hearts stop at the same time.

There was a moment on the boat, just before it got gobbled by the sea, when we all sat in silence. The woman with the pomegranate towel wrapped her arms around her trembling daughters and sang them a lullaby. We sat hunched under the heavy darkness and listened to her soft voice singing of love we all had known.

“Close your eyes, my darling, and sleep.
Today, I rock you to sleep,
Tomorrow, this cradle won’t be yours.
Don’t you mind the sounds you hear,
Don’t you mind the darkness you see,
I will always be with you, my dear,
Holding your hand while you dream.”

I closed my eyes and saw my mother. She smiled at me, and my chest lightened.

When the boat vanished from under us, people’s screams were like animals’. But the winter waters silenced us fast, freezing our bodies and minds.

“Hold on to me! You must hold on to me,” I shouted to Zayn.

He swam to me, and his big eyes locked on to mine.

“When I grow up, I’m going to live in a desert,” he panted while jolting his arms and legs to stay above the water.

I grabbed his arm, kicking my legs to help him stay afloat.

“I’m sorry, Zayn. I’m so sorry. We should’ve stayed in Rome.”

Our bodies quivered from the cold.

“Nah,” he wheezed through purple lips. “It was getting boring there, anyway. And all that food was making us fat.”

I chuckled and whimpered at the same time.

“Are we going to die, Zayn?”

“P-probably.”

My teeth chattered. “I’m s-scared.”

“What h-happened to ‘as long as I’m with you, I’m not s-scared’?” Zayn stuttered, gasping in between words.

“I’m scared when you’re scared.”

“I’m too c-cold to be s-scared.”

The icy water was turning our bones into stone.

I looked around, and the sea was dotted with people in red life jackets.

“Do you think it will be painful, Zayn?”

“N-no, it will be n-nice. Like drinking hot sweet tea by the f-fire.”

I sighed.

My breathing slowed, and it took all my strength to say, “F-find me on the other side?”

I didn’t fear death as much as I feared losing Zayn.

His blue lips lifted with a smile, and his voice suddenly became stronger. “In heaven or hell.”

And with those words, the cold retreated, my body softened and everything stopped.