“What are you doing?”
…
“How long have you been here?
…
“Is any of your family with you?”
…
“Have you ever tried to leave?”
…
The long pauses after my whispered questions were filled with silence from the boy, except for the last one, to which he finally mumbled, “Leave? Where would I go?”
He glanced again at his commander, whose attention was still elsewhere, then whispered, “Papa knew the soldiers were coming. He and Mama argued about it. I didn’t understand why until they came for me. They embraced Papa and shook his hand. They left him a parcel and took me with them. No one said a word, and my mother was crying and wouldn’t look at me as the truck pulled away. I called out for her but my father blocked her view and then I was gone.
“When I asked what was happening, one of the soldiers laughed and told me that my father had traded me to the soldiers and made a poor bargain of it. If I went home, he would just send me back.
“So now I do what the commander wants and stay out of the way of the older boys, and try not to be scared when we go to fight the enemy. I do not want to die like the others who were here with me when I arrived.”
I shivered and did not know what to say to this boy.
11.
The next day a whole troop of children was sent out on foot, leading a convoy of trucks crammed with older boys and girls. I picked my moment and asked a grown-up soldier where they were going.
He stared down at me, picking then sucking his teeth, as if he was deciding whether I was worth an answer. Then he said, “The cockroaches bury anti-personnel and anti-tank mines on the roads and larger trails. We send new kids like you in first to clear the way because it’s better for the cause that you step on the mines—we don’t want to lose a soldier with more experience.”
He stared at me some more, as if daring me to argue with his logic, then said, “It makes sense. We also send you inexperienced ones ahead to attract enemy fire and use up most of their ammo—we know they don’t have much. If you survive your first battle then you might be worth really training.”
It seemed to me that the young ones were going to suffer a lot more than the older ones, but this whole world was upside down. I gathered my courage and asked him if he had any of the bitter drink. He laughed and gave me some sticky brown gum and told me to try it instead.
When the soldiers came back late that night, I stood at the opening of the lean-to and watched. I could not tell if any of the youngest ones were missing, though some of them were injured. The rest were either very happy, dancing and singing, or very quiet. I reached inside my waistband to find the last little bit of sticky gum, popped it in my mouth, went back inside and fell asleep.
12.
Outside the commander’s lean-to, which stood out from all the rest because it was where smells of delicious food came from, a girl my age was sitting and weaving long grasses into a bracelet.
She smiled at me when I walked by and asked me to sit with her.
She told me that she was the commander’s best wife, and that because of this she always got the best food and drinks. She then offered me a piece of meat and some sliced cassava from her bowl, which I gobbled down greedily. Remembering my manners, I thanked her. I asked her why she was here, why she didn’t escape or try to go home.
She looked at me with a tilted head, then lowered her voice. “This must be my home now. Some of the girls were sent away from here because they were sick or pregnant, but one of them came back, begging to stay here. She told me that when she tried to go home to her village, she was shamed and turned away. Her own relatives threatened her. She works here now.
“And for me it would be worse. When they came to our hut, two soldiers tied up my father and brothers and took me in front of them. No, no, no. I cannot return.
“At first, I wished very much to escape—even just to disappear in the bush. Each night a different soldier would come and sleep with me. I was ashamed and wished to die.
“But then I was lucky. I was chosen by the commander to be one of his wives. Now I am protected from the other soldiers, I live in a hut, I eat nice food, I am in charge of much in the camp. I have a better life here than most girls.”
Sadly, silently, I nodded, and chewed another piece of my brown gum. I now knew that it was called hashish.
13.
The next day, after a breakfast of beans and goat’s milk, one of the lieutenants pulled me aside.
I don’t know what he was seeing on my face, but he explained to me that going back to the life I had before I was captured was not an option for me anymore.
“You and your pretty brother now belong to us, and you can be proud—you will soon be fighting this war too, for the good side, the side of freedom!” I didn’t know what he meant by this “freedom” because I was a prisoner here. Was there something that he and the others were doing that would make life better than it was when I was in my village and with my family? But all the leaders here said things like this over and over, during the days and the long evenings by the fires, and they said it like they were really convinced it was true.
I wanted so much to belong to something or someone so that I was not so alone and afraid all the time. I had not seen Mosi for days. I missed my mother and my father and my sister. I wanted to scream and run away no matter what. I couldn’t help myself and shouted at him, “My father was murdered! My sister …”
“It is terrible.” He was calm, his voice almost kind. “Your brother Mashaka was a bad young man—he was a traitor, you see. He had joined the opposing side and was acting as a spy. We have taken care of him, my friend. You are now safe. You and Mosi are with us now and we will avenge the terrible slaughter of your family.”
He stared at me so hard after he stopped talking I was confused. I tried to think back to that day, but it was a blur of strangers and chaos and blood.
My brother. Mashaka. He was gone too. Tears filled my eyes and I looked away to follow a pair of dragonflies soaring past me, into the sky. At least my father died trying to protect us, to defend our lives. My brother, he was dead only for war.
I followed the lieutenant to a field where they were teaching the newest children how to use guns. He picked one up and handed it to me and pointed to the others so that I knew I was to join in the training. He said I was going to learn to shoot people who were bad and needed to be punished. We were going to save our country. We were going to be the warriors who protect those who are oppressed in the struggle for freedom. Again he used the word freedom, but what did it really mean? I was not free, nor were any of the other children. How do we create freedom if we are not free?
The gun smelled of oil and was a little slippery and when I dropped it, the leader hit me with his stick. “Never drop your rifle because it is precious and it is your best friend from now on. You will clean it and sleep with it and carry it all the time. Your lieutenant will tell you when to put bullets in it, but for now we will teach you how to aim at targets. The first time you hit a target I promise you will find it very exciting, and you’ll be proud to see it burst into pieces.”
14.
There were seven of us who slept on the dirt floor of the lean-to. It was too small for this many people, but in the loneliness of night it was somewhat comforting to be close, even to strangers.
All night, every night, I heard soft whimpers and muffled sobs from the other children. It seemed that we could say things to the black night that we couldn’t say to each other’s eyes in the day. Fragments of thoughts and unconnected words would float through the air above us, hovering, seeking a safe place to land.
“Mommy!”
“I had to.”
“No!”
“They made me.”
“I’m sorry.”
Hideous images were conjured on that ceiling: Flesh splitting under knife blades. Brothers butchered like animals. Siste
rs raped then tossed in latrine pits. Babies snatched from their mothers’ breasts and dashed to the ground with milk still spilling from their lips. People reduced to meat wrapped in cloth.
During the day I was so tired from the night, that I could not stop trying to cry. But I had no tears left. It just hurt and my eyes would get blurry and I would choke a little and feel my heart pounding. I was so homesick yet I had no more home.
“Training” consisted of waking before the sun. We would have to fill sacks with heavy rocks and then carry them on our backs as we ran around the compound in the dark or went for long marches in the darkest places in the bush. Where the night had once drawn safely around me like a curtain, it now frightened me. Everything—low bushes like enemies crouching, the rustle of insects like crunching boots on gravel—was potentially alive and dangerous. And yet, on those long night drills, my mind would sometimes still be lulled by the thick, soft darkness back to my home, my world, my child world, my Kidom.
If we faltered, the commanders chased us with thick sticks, hitting us on the backs of our knees. They would push us to the ground, shout in our ears and scream orders again and again. Before the sun was even at its peak, we were exhausted.
Then, often without being allowed to remove the sacks from our backs, we would practise shooting. The guns were not as heavy as they looked, though they were too long for some of the children to hold steady and straight. Those kids were sent back to do chores in the camp or to carry food and water and ammunition for the rest of the soldiers. I was scared the first time the leader put a bullet in my rifle and told me to shoot a big melon a little ways away. The rifle had come to life and it was now a dangerous thing. There were at least twenty of us training that day, and we were told to line up and shoot one after another. When it was my turn, I held the gun up and steadied it to see through the sights and find the melon. When the leader yelled “Fire!” I pulled the trigger and the gun made such a loud noise and hit my shoulder so hard I nearly dropped it. I do not know where my bullet went.
Even after all the kids fired, the melon was still there. The leader was very mad and yelled at us for wasting very valuable ammunition. He warned us that we had better try harder the next time. And there were so many next times until we could hit the melon.
Every so often, a gun would spit fire and hot metal pieces as the cartridge shattered at the breech instead of firing normally, and the child holding it would be burned on his face and arms, or be cut and bloody, or even blinded. Crying and screams were so common, though, that I got used to them and stopped noticing after a while.
Explosions from hand grenades and bullets were terrifying. The older soldiers fired near us so that we would get used to the sounds of battle. I was always scared that one of them would aim too close or too poorly. Dirt would shower us with each explosion. Our tears and sweat caked the dirt, and our clothes and skin were torn from running in the bush.
Each day, one or two children were pulled aside, usually after they had inflicted some degree of torment on someone smaller than themselves. The next day they’d turn up with a camouflage bandana, a bunch of feathers, an army vest—a reward from the commander.
This one afternoon when the sun was at its hottest, we were lined up as usual at long rickety tables and instructed to tend to the weapons. We piled ammunition, and then stripped, oiled and reassembled our guns. The leaders made us repeat these drills for hours so we could do them with our eyes closed, just as we would have to do when we went for a long night march to battle and had to clean our weapons before the attack. I soon got very good at this, and the lieutenant noticed that the kids near me would ask me for help with theirs. I actually was proud of my new skills, and I became attached to my own AK-47 and did my best to keep it clean and oiled.
A young girl I had seen before came up to me this day as I was putting my gun back together. She winked at me and held out her fists. I stuck out my palms, and into one hand she placed a piece of candied fruit. And into the other, a pretty pink beetle shell that looked like a jewel, it was so shiny and smooth.
I longed to speak to her, but the lieutenant shouted for me to get back to work.
I put the fruit in my mouth, and the shell in my pocket, gently. As the sweetness melted on my tongue, the shiny pink of the shell misted my sight, and I was back with Kesi, flying through Kidom.
Later that day, after a shooting practice and an interminable hike with heavy sacks, I went to seek out the girl. It was quite dark already, and I didn’t know which shelter she was in. I peeked into several to see youths playing cards and smoking. I checked the area around the cooking fire where many of the girls congregated, watching over some of the younger children who were doing chores, but she was not there.
The camp at night was poorly lit with small fires, and there were many shadows and sounds of exaggerated laughter, submissive moaning and the odd shriek. Several of the children were sick and uncared for, or, having been beaten, they were suffering from wounds. At night, the hell of day turned into a black hole where devils were even more evident: living ghosts.
As I passed by the commander’s tent, I thought I would ask his best wife if she knew the girl. I heard a commotion coming from behind the tent and crept carefully to peer around the corner. The commander and two of his lieutenants were standing around a girl who was lying on the ground. The commander’s wife was holding her shoulders down. As the girl writhed back and forth, I could see it was my friend.
She was naked, and one at a time the men lay on top of her, grunting and groaning. The leaders often did that to young girls but also to some of the most delicate of the young boys too. It was so evil and it hurt us so much. This was torture and punishment, but with luck you might avoid it by being a very good and obedient foot soldier.
I went back to my dirty hut and sat on the floor facing the wall, chewing the last of my hashish. I pulled the delicate beetle shell from my pocket and crushed it in my fist.
15.
For days, Gamba, the lieutenant assigned to my group, had been preparing us for a supplies raid.
The youngest children in our group had gravitated to me, and they followed me with more and more devotion each day. Sometimes I told them stories of Kidom, or played with them the quieter games that I had played with Kesi, games that Mosi had also played with me. But other times I didn’t feel like it. I would tell them to be quiet and listen to Gamba so that I could be alone.
We spent a lot of time listening to Gamba talk and talk and talk, but it was so difficult to understand what he was really saying. It was even harder to measure what he kept telling us against what I had seen and what had happened over these last weeks. The more he spoke, the more confused I became. The hashish, the lack of food, the nightmares that woke me every time I tried to sleep: all these things were mixing me up.
Some of the young soldiers had told me stories of being forced to kill people with machetes. They would chop up the bodies, and blood would splatter all over their hands and arms and legs and uniform. The leaders wanted to teach people a lesson by making them suffer, but other times they used the machetes because they did not have any bullets left. But Gamba insisted that we were in the right to do these things, that the evils being perpetrated against us were what we were fighting about. I shook my head to clear it but the horror scenes were always there. This madness was being forced into our heads day in and day out. It was like a sickness in my brain that would not leave except when I could get some of the drugs, and then all would become cloudy again and I was numb and nothing hurt me for some hours. It was an escape I wanted more and more.
One afternoon I set the little ones up with some hard nuts we had collected so they could play a game of marbles, and I went off on my own. Gamba came after me. He told me in confidence that I was crucial to the success of my group, that I was not only the tallest but also the smartest and understood better than anyone the importance of our work. I did not tell him how little I understood. I never questioned his reasons for
selecting me. I was just relieved to be noticed without reprimand.
We were standing on a dusty patch behind my lean-to. I told him that I was ready to be in charge of the younger ones and I would do what I could to protect them, but I wasn’t sure I could go into battle. “What if someone fought back? I am still afraid that I could kill someone for real. Mosi would never do such a thing.”
“Bah, Mosi.” Gamba rolled his eyes, but wouldn’t explain himself, or answer any of my questions about my brother, who I’d only seen once at a distance, carrying a load of firewood. “Don’t be stupid,” Gamba said. “Do you feel bad when you swat flies? Or pluck blades of grass? These people are nothing—insects standing in our way. Besides, we don’t kill everyone. I have the power to pick and choose. The best, like you, we take.”
Swatting flies. My mind leapt back to me and Kesi sitting on her mat, perfectly still, the circle drawn around us, willing the pretty green flies to settle on our out-stretched arms, which we had smeared with honey. If we charmed enough flies to cling to our arms, maybe we could fly too. We begged them to come to us, treasured those that landed, sang to them.
I tried not to share this memory with Gamba, but it came out anyway. He laughed loudly, and then pulled black feathers out of his pocket, which he twisted into my hair, like Tinochika’s horrible fetish. He told me he could grant me flight and that I never had to crawl with vermin again.
For three days he spent all his spare time with me. We would sit and chew hashish or smoke marijuana and I would fly and fly. He discussed our higher purpose of freedom with me as if I was an adult. All those words were still difficult for me to grasp or feel. But I had gotten used to the repetition of the argument and was not so confused when he talked about the cause. He pushed on me the reasons for the cruelty, the reasons for the horrors, why it was so important to fight back and even kill people. He pushed me: could I do it? I couldn’t answer and that annoyed Gamba, but he would continue to talk and gave me the drugs that I needed to create the numbness I craved. Constant and repetitious words driven into our ears and minds, drills and drugs day in and day out, following orders because of the drugs and to get more drugs. We were like machines most of the time as long as we had enough drugs. And I realized that I had become a child soldier like the older ones and that my small group would surely be tested soon. With people, not melons, at the end of my gun.