The Refugee Shelter

The Refuge Centre     
Sian Chapman

The sound of the planes filled the refuge, striking the walls, echoing through the empty spaces. Around her, the crowd quietened, listening. Tanya, turning to the woman next to her, saw a look of terror pass over her face, as she bent to clutch her baby, her body protective.
A slow, seeping horror filled Tanya. The bomb flashes which had rained over the city earlier echoed through her mind.
The planes were flying too low.
One man was moving through the immobile crowd. A foreigner, like her, making for the stairs.
“Hey, stop.” She shouted. The man ignored her, raising his foot to the first step. “I said stop!” Her voice carried through the silent population, defeating the scream of the planes, defeating the quiet murmuring of the shelter. They were praying, she realised, praying in Arabic.
“Get off the stairs!” Her shouts went up an octave, her hysteria washing into the people around her, merging with their prayers. Tanya swayed, her the sound of the fading planes taring at her ears. She stared around her, at the people muttering with fervour to someone she couldn’t see, couldn’t share.
They knew. They knew.
The prayers became panicked shouts, religion losing the fight against panic. A massive flash of light, a tremendous crashing, the earth throwing itself away from the threat of the sky.  The earth shook, the sound rattling through her teeth, rising through her, echoing to the back of her mind.
People either jumped or were thrown. Tanya jumped. She didn’t know where. You couldn’t get away from the bombs; the sound they made filled the shelter. It was everywhere, to the left, to the right, inside of her head, outside.
And there was the stench of gunpowder, overwhelming another, subtler scent that she tasted in her mouth. A metallic taste.
Blood.
To her left, the screaming stopped. Terror gripped her, hot and panicy, overriding the cold, remoteness of the shock. She knew even as she screamed, clutching at her bloody leg, pain crawling over her skin, that if anyone had been alive to the left of her, they would have been screaming too.
In the middle of the silence, a child’s cry shattered the fog of deafness. It was the pitch which let her hear it – everything else, the murmuring people around her, the sound of the children that had been playing outside, the sound of the birds…She could hear nothing. The planes and the explosion afterwards had deafened her.
Choking on her screams and the dust, she gritted her teeth, dragging herself towards the void of silence.
Behind her, those that were still alive started to stir. Blocking the pain out, Tanya dragged herself over the rubble on the floor. Again the child cried out.
“Hey!” she called out, her voice travelling over the bloody empty space. “Where are you? Are you all right… do you need help…”
She clenched her hands in pain, the call dying in her throat as she reached the first of the bodies. A gabble of muffled panicked language stretched over the space, grasping at her as she froze.
Whatever happened, she couldn’t let the boy see the bodies. She could already feel the cold fingers of shock climbing up her back, the smell tearing the inside of her stomach to pieces. Closing her eyes, she swallowed the bile rising in her throat. There would be enough time for that later.
Another burst of sound, half human, half animal with panic, made her look to the left. At first, she couldn’t see anything apart from a dead woman, who seemed lost to sleep, not death, her black head cloth disguising the spread of blood.
Underneath the dead body, the boy cried out again.
“Good god,” whispered Tanya, scrambling over. Kneeling down, she rested her hands on the body, snatching them away as the blood, hidden by the dark clothes, stained her white hands. The world swayed, going fuzzy at the edges. There was just something about the blood, about…
No. She had to…
Grateful for the cloth headdress and long clothes – she could almost pretend it was a bundle of rags – she put her shoulder under the bodies arm, and heaved.
Tanya froze, the dead eyes catching her as the body turned, glazed over, empty. Gone.
The boy, still yelling in a babble of language, grabbed her around the waist, burying his head in her chest, his hair tickling her chin.
Seeing herself mirrored in the eyes, Tanya slowly got to her feet, stumbling as the boy’s grip tightened. She backed away from the eyes, tripping over her own feet. The boy cried out and let go as she fell, her thoughts tumbling out of control, going blank, a cyclone of panic.
She could see her mortality in those eyes, could see how young the woman had been. Could see it could’ve been someone possible like her, could see her own death…
“Okay, okay.” Tanya said breathing deeply, standing, whipping her nose and mouth with her sleeve, trying not to look at her bloody hand. If only someone would just help…
The silence shattered, people moaning. On the edge of the crowd, Tanya watched as a jeep, led by a Red Cross bus approached through the dust. Hope lept in her chest. The bus passed them. Tanya ignored it. The people in the jeep were white people. People speaking in language she could understand. Flags she recognised.
American, French, British, Canadian…
Australian. Tanya stood, and started limping forwards. Something clutched at her long yellow skirt. Looking down, she saw the child looking up at her, fear and mistrust in his eyes.
She looked longingly at the foreign officials. Surely the boy had relatives somewhere, and besides, the Red Cross…
Sighing, she bent down and sealed her fate.
“So, what’s your name?”