Crossbones

26

AHL HITS HURDLES AT EVERY BEND, THE MORE HE THINKS ABOUT the safest and least cumbersome way to get Taxliil out of Somalia. It is difficult enough for him to step over the threshold and doubly difficult to deal with Taxliil, who is a misguided youth because of his involvement with Shabaab. Taxliil has a way of throwing another wrench into the works every time Ahl manages to wrest one free. He finds all this exhausting, and he feels himself in danger of cracking up, never mind his stepson.

His plan was to get Taxliil to Djibouti, where they would present themselves at the U.S. embassy and explain the loss of Taxliil’s passport. But the plan is so far proving to be unworkable, because they need to find a travel document of some description to leave Bosaso and enter Djibouti. No airline will accept him as passenger unless he has a valid passport. Ahl thinks that as more twists in Taxliil’s tale come to light, the more numerous are the drawbacks that are bound to crop up.

Meanwhile, Ahl has been in touch with a tearful Yusur in Minneapolis, has held long brainstorming sessions with Jeebleh in Nairobi, and continues to communicate with Malik by phone and by text message. Xalan and Warsame are doing their best to help as well, but things don’t look good.

When he is not thinking like a runaway, Taxliil has on several occasions apologized to his parents, admitting to his foolhardy trust in the imam back in the Twin Cities, at whose prompting he volunteered to join up with Shabaab. Now he knows better; now he knows what is what, and has learned his lesson the hard way. He wants to forgive and forget — or to be forgiven, and for the entire episode to be forgotten.

But does he realize things are not simple for him and the twenty-odd runaways? Taxliil claims he does, yet he does nothing to show this is the case. Ahl is reminded of a proverb, probably French, about the unfortunate man who falls on his back and as a result breaks his nose. Taxliil keeps doing the opposite of what he says he will do, making an already difficult situation more complicated. He falls asleep in the middle of one of Ahl’s debriefing sessions. When Ahl tries to iron out the major inconsistencies in his story, Taxliil loses his cool and casts uncalled-for aspersions on his stepfather.

All the members of the household help as best they can, but keep their distance, too. Faai plies Ahl with black coffee and Taxliil with sugary drinks. Xalan gets busy organizing a Somali passport with help from a friend with access to someone working in the passports division in Bosaso. Taxliil will travel with Ahl to Djibouti, away from the ubiquitous Shabaab assassins, who if they hear about his presence in Bosaso and in this house may harm him and others as well; one never knows with them. Once Ahl has taken him to Djibouti, Ahl, Malik, and Jeebleh will work in tandem to facilitate his safe return to the United States. Of course, they can’t count on criminals like Fidno and No-Name, who appear to have had a hand in his escape, to keep quiet for long; hence Ahl’s proposal that Malik “buy their silence” by granting them an interview.

Xalan telephones Ahl to confirm that she has reserved seats for him and Taxliil on tomorrow’s flight to Djibouti, and that she is close to organizing the passport for Taxliil. The news has a galvanizing effect, and Taxliil knuckles down to clarifying his account to Ahl. Ahl’s aim is twofold: one, to understand what happened for his own peace of mind; and to help Taxliil prepare for the grilling by the U.S. authorities that he will go through when he reenters the States.

First, though, Taxliil wants to hear, not for the first time, how they discovered he was gone from Minneapolis. It is as if he takes pleasure in having kept his parents, his friends, and the school authorities in the dark while he arranged his departure, and got away without anyone figuring it out. Ahl pampers him with answers: he and Yusur thought Taxliil was at school or at the mosque, and didn’t wonder until late in the evening where he might be. Since Yusur was working the night shift, it fell to him to search Taxliil’s room for evidence of his whereabouts, which is when he discovered that both his passport and his shoulder bag were missing.

“Then what did you do?”

“When we were despairing of ever finding you, because no one had seen you, we went around to the police stations and the hospitals,” Ahl replies. “Petrified as we were, we were also somewhat relieved when you called two days later to say you were in Somalia.”

Taxliil gloats, “But I wasn’t in Somalia then.”

This is the first time he has said this, and Ahl can’t decide if he is lying. That’s the problem with lying: one lie can make one have doubts about the truth of what has gone before or what is to come later.

“Where did you ring from, then?”

“I was in Lamu, about to travel by boat to Kismayo.”

“Let’s start from the beginning, before you got to Kenya. What route did you take to get to Nairobi?”

“To Abu Dhabi, with a stopover in Amsterdam. From there we flew direct to Nairobi,” Taxliil says. “For company, I had another student from Jefferson High, although I hadn’t known him previously.”

“Did he worship at the mosque as well?”

“Yes.”

“Did you know him well enough to trust him?”

“We just never connected before,” Taxliil says, adding, “You know how it is. Sometimes you connect fast with some people, sometimes you don’t. But during the long trip, we connected, became best buddies. And that felt good.”

Ahl has a natural sympathy for this kind of attitude. He likes it when someone gets on well with others, when someone makes the effort to make others feel good. Taxliil used to have a quality that gave comfort to those in his company. He used to be easy to get along with; he was a sweet child. Spending time with Shabaab has turned him into someone else, a plaintive, fearful youth, full of misgivings about the world and its inhabitants.

“Now, tell me how you got from Nairobi to Lamu.”

“Several of us flew separately to Malindi, where we eventually met up after taking different routes to Nairobi,” Taxliil says, proud that he is remembering the version he has given before.

“And from Malindi?”

“From Malindi, we took a boat to Lamu.”

“And from Lamu to Kismayo?”

“That’s right.”

Ahl is deliberately stretching their conversation a little, to give himself more time to study Taxliil’s expressions. “And after arriving in Kismayo?”

“We spent a night in Kismayo before separating into small units. We gave our American passports over to the minders assigned to take us to the forest, where we would receive our training and instructions. I took ill on the second day.”

“What was the nature of this sickness?”

“Malaria is endemic in the Juba Valley.”

So far so good. Not a hitch or an overlong pause. Then Ahl pluckily plunges into Shabaab-infested waters, asking Taxliil to name the names of his minders and tell exactly when and where he met them.

“What was the name of the chief of the camp?”

Taxliil repeats the same response he has given several times before. “We never knew the real names of the instructors. Nor did we get to know the names of our minders, or those to whom we handed over our passports.”

“Do you recall anything else about any of them?”

“Our instructor had a northern accent, and yelled at us a lot, and wouldn’t tolerate any back talk; he was quite a taskmaster.” Then half-laughing and half-serious, he tries to imitate his instructor. “‘We are not part of history. We are making history, living history! We are not liberators, fellows,’ he would chant. ‘We are martyrs, through the expression of our fury, through our ambition in action, to lead this nation away from self-ruin.’ Then he’d resume his chorus. ‘We are not part of history. We are making history, living history!’ We nicknamed him Taariikh, ‘History.’ It is hilarious when I look back,” Taxliil says, relaxed for the moment.

“What did your training comprise?”

“It was like boot camp,” Taxliil says. “A run before dawn prayer, oatmeal for breakfast, more physical training, bomb-construction training. Lunch, prayer, a half-hour break, then back at it until nightfall, no break except for prayer times.” He is on a roll now, and he goes on without any prompting from Ahl. “The boy I knew from Jefferson asked to be taught not only how to build bombs but how to defuse them.”

“What reaction did he get?”

“A tongue-lashing. The instructor called him a softie. He explained that Shabaab was not in the business of defusing bombs, but in the business of making them and causing as much destruction as possible, until we gained power and set up an Islamic state, the first true Islamic state not only on the continent but in the whole world. An example to others, a model and a beacon to other Muslims.”

“So how did you fare there?”

“It was all fun at first.”

“And then?”

Taxliil seems bewildered, as if he has gotten lost on his way to the answer. What is it that upsets him? What are the subjects about which he is not yet prepared to speak?

Ahl asks, “Did you make any friends?”

Taxliil said, “I knew I could trust Ali-Kaboole. He was more or less my age, but went to Roosevelt High, very bright, kind, always solicitous about me, generous to a fault. I found a friend in him, he was reliable. He reminded me of Samir.”

“What’s become of Kaboole?”

“Kaboole died — blown up by one of our own.”

Ahl asks for an explanation.

Taxliil says, “One of the clan-based factions fighting Shabaab for control of the coastal city of Kismayo killed him in a clash that claimed the lives of several of our best.”

“Did you take part in the fighting yourself?”

“I’ve never taken part in any fighting.”

“Why not?”

“I couldn’t fight; I had no spectacles.”

“How did you cope?”

“Funny you should ask. Before he died, Kaboole took part in a fire-fight in Kismayo, and found a pair on the battlefield, a pair thick as the bottom of a bottle. They belonged to an old man, from the enemy side, killed by one of ours. Kaboole brought them to me, thinking spectacles are spectacles, and any pair would do. This became our joke.”

“Nonetheless, you used them?”

“I used them. I had nothing else.”

“Then what?”

“I was assigned ‘civilian’ duty, and after a while I proved useful as a computer programmer. I was transferred to the publications division and soon promoted. My job was mujahid liaison. I was an interpreter for the foreign contingents training the cadre in bomb building and in explosives.”

“It doesn’t seem that was very harsh.”

Taxliil is quick to disagree. “Life was harsh. No TV. No fun. No games. It felt easy at first. But later, it felt like tasting a piece of hell served daily, along with your meals. We often heard the term shahid, martyr. When we joined, we believed in everything we heard about paradise and the houris in heaven. But eventually we realized it meant the one whose turn it is to die.”

Ahl doesn’t know if Taxliil’s initial enthusiasm to join Shabaab is now entirely replaced by the hostile attitude he displays at present, even though this is to be expected. But will he continue vacillating between several contradictory positions until they get to Djibouti and then feel much worse at his grilling by the U.S. authorities?

“Any idea what became of your passports?”

“We heard stories. That is all.”

“What kind of stories?”

“The stories contradicted one another,” Taxliil says. “We heard that our American passports were being used to bring foreign fighters into Somalia, but knew this couldn’t be true, because all the foreign fighters were older than us. Then we heard that some of the Shabaab leaders used them to get their sons into America,” he says. “I don’t know if this is true or not. I don’t know.”

Ahl has a glimpse, and not for the first time, of the immense difficulties Somalis are certain to face in America in the future.

“So how did you end up in the desert camp where Saifullah offered to martyr himself?” Ahl asks.

“After I got into trouble.”

“What kind of trouble?”

“My instructor History, you see, had me teach English to his daughter — but only orally, as I couldn’t read to her, given I had no spectacles. Then she became pregnant.”

“You mean you made her pregnant?”

“I did no such thing, Dad.”

“Then what happened?”

“Then History had me ‘marry’ her.”

Ahl is furious. “He forced you to marry his daughter, even though the baby wasn’t yours?”

“That’s right, Dad.”

Wait until Yusur hears this part, Ahl thinks. “And then what?”

“Then he had me transferred to the fighting corps.”

“Do you think he wanted you out of the way, dead?”

Taxliil stares at Ahl without answering.

“What was his motive if he didn’t want you killed?”

“That’s what one of my friends thought.”

“What did you think?”

“I was too afraid to think.”

There is a pause. Then Taxliil says, “Dad I’m too tired to answer any more questions today.”

“Just a couple more and then we’re done.”

Somewhere close by, a muezzin is calling the faithful to prayer. Taxliil seems agitated, as if debating whether to get up and answer the call or to stay seated and answer the remaining questions.

Ahl asks, “Do you remember the name of the travel agency that booked your flights?”

“I do not know the name of the travel agency that arranged our flights, or who paid for the tickets,” Taxliil replies.

“Did you collect the tickets yourselves?”

“We picked them up at different airports, when we presented ourselves with our passports,” Taxliil says. “They were e-tickets, every single one of them, from our starting points in the States all the way to our final destination. We did not all meet until Lamu, and then traveled together by boat.”

Ahl is about to resume his questioning when he observes that Taxliil has once again retreated into the private world of which he is king.

They take a break, and Ahl tries to reach Malik to apprise him of the fresh developments. But he can only reach Malik’s voice mail and doesn’t bother to leave a message.

When they resume, Ahl explains that they’ll be leaving for Djibouti the next day.

“When do we go home, to Minneapolis?”

“That we don’t know,” replies Ahl. “You’ll have to wait and see.”

Ahl is certain that Taxliil’s name will be among the names the FBI have on file. The U.S. embassy will insist on debriefing Taxliil, and may even fly out an agent to talk to him in Djibouti. He is unsure if Taxliil is the first of the twenty or so Somalis to return. After debriefing, he will most likely be flown to Stuttgart, in handcuffs, on a special military flight. But he spares Taxliil the details for now. It is one thing to prepare him for what to expect, another to frighten him unnecessarily.

“Do you think I’ll be treated as a security risk?”

“Why do you ask?”

Taxliil says, “Because Saifullah said that he preferred dying in dignity to being arrested and handcuffed by the Americans and treated with suspicion for the rest of his days.”

“There is the possibility you may be considered a security risk,” Ahl says. “But because you are still underage, they may go easy on you.”

Taxliil says, “Are you trying to frighten me, Dad?”

“No, my son,” Ahl says.

“I am starting to regret I didn’t go on with it.”

“I am glad you didn’t go on with it,” Ahl says.

He thinks there is no despair as profound as that of a teenager whose innocence has led him to place his trust unwisely.

Xalan returns home with the air tickets and the passport of a boy of similar age to Taxliil. Although it was issued months earlier, no one has picked it up, and her friend in the passports division is prepared to take the risk of lending it to her. He’ll deny knowing anything about it if the theft is discovered. At best, if the deceit is not discovered, the passport is good only into Djibouti, which a Somali doesn’t need a visa to enter. To enter the United States, Taxliil needs to apply for a U.S. visa, which is difficult to obtain at the best of times.

There is a more immediate problem: Taxliil is refusing to come down from his room; he wants to be alone, and won’t entertain the thought of trying on the clothes Xalan has bought for him. She and Ahl try to cajole him out of his downbeat mood.

“How did your meeting go before he went up?” Xalan asks Ahl.

Ahl tells her everything.

“Maybe you scared him,” says Xalan.

“I didn’t mean to.”

“Maybe he thinks he’ll be flown to Guantánamo.”

“I said nothing of the sort. I was just preparing him for what might happen.”

They are silent for a long time.

Ahl telephones Malik to tell him that he and Taxliil are leaving for Djibouti the next day. He asks Malik how much longer he intends to stay on, and Malik, not for the first time, decides against telling him how deeply worried he is at present about his safety. He says only that he intends to do a few more interviews and then leave. When Ahl shares with him his good news about the tickets and the passport, Malik expresses delight and says, “Maybe I’ll see you sooner than you think.”

Ahl then rings Jeebleh and fills him in on the progress they have made so far. Just before they disconnect, he mentions how he inveigled Malik into agreeing to interview Fidno and one of Fidno’s associates.

Jeebleh is furious with both brothers and says so. “Why do you endanger his life, cajoling him to interview two criminals at once in the same room in a hotel? This is far too risky. Do you realize what you’ve done?”

“I am indebted to Fidno,” Ahl says.

“One is never indebted to a criminal,” Jeebleh says.

“Well, I am,” Ahl retorts. “His intervention has, after all, brought Taxliil home.”

“What’s got into you?”

Ahl says, “I love my son.”

“How can you behave as carelessly as you’ve done towards Malik?” Jeebleh says.

“What do you want me to do?”

“I want you to think of what you’ve done, the danger caused to your brother.”

“The matter is out of our hands,” Ahl says.

Jeebleh disconnects the line in fury.