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‘Did you see the bodies washing up on Cleethorpes Beach?’
Evie’s silence answers the question.
‘I’d like to take a closer look,’ says Dr Bennett. ‘Just to be sure.’
‘To be sure of what?’
‘That nothing is wrong neurologically – a brain bleed or a haematoma. I want to schedule a brain scan, an MRI. It’s a machine that uses strong magnetic fields and radio waves to take pictures inside the body.’
‘Does it hurt?’ asks Evie.
‘No, but it’s noisy and not great if you’re claustrophobic. Do you mind small spaces?’
‘I love them,’ says Evie, not joking.
I’m standing at the window. I hear a crowd chanting outside. Pulling aside the Venetian blinds, I see people gathered at the hospital entrance. Some are holding placards and waving Union Jack flags. The protesters are predominantly white and male. Some are shirtless and shoeless, covered in tattoos or wrapped in flags or wearing Guy Fawkes masks or red MAGA caps. The apparent ringleader is wearing a camouflage jacket and holding a placard that reads, Stop the Invasion. Other signs have different messages – Defend our Borders, Turn Back the Boats, Take Back Britain – while a few declare that Jesus Saves and White Lives Matter. Maybe they took a wrong turn somewhere.
A dozen uniformed police officers are blocking the access road, preventing the protesters from reaching the hospital entrance. Each time an ambulance arrives, the officers force them to the footpath, clearing the road.
‘They’ve been arriving all morning,’ says Dr Bennett.
‘One survivor. It hardly seems worth it,’ I say.
‘More boats have been arriving. Another this morning.’
‘Where?’
‘Further south. I heard it on the radio.’
A teenage boy begins beating a snare drum and the protesters start to sing. Eyes shining. Mouths open.
Rule, Britannia! Britannia, rule the waves!
Britons never, never, never will be slaves.
11
Evie
The MRI machine looks like one of those space pods where astronauts go to cryosleep when they’re travelling to distant galaxies. It is a long metal tube with a narrow tray that slides inside. I can’t wear my ear studs or rings or other jewellery.
‘We have to strap your head down to hold it still,’ says the technician, a black guy with cornrows in his hair. ‘Otherwise, the images will be blurry.’
‘Nobody likes a fuzzy photograph,’ I say, making a joke, because I’m nervous. He doesn’t crack a smile.
‘These headphones will dampen the noise,’ he says, as he slides them over my ears. ‘We can play you some music. Any requests?’ I can’t think of a single song. He opens my fingers, giving me a buzzer. ‘If you start to panic or feel unwell, press the button and we’ll stop the scan.’
Once I’m strapped down, staring at the ceiling, the technician leaves and the tray begins to move, sliding backwards into the machine. The noise begins – a thumping sound that seems to pass right through me.
I wonder if an MRI scan can tell them what I’m thinking. What if I imagined the filthiest sex act? Would it light up some part of my brain? I don’t like that idea so I try not to think of sex, which is exactly what I do. Shit! I try to concentrate on something else. Anything but sex. I begin counting down from a thousand. Eventually, I grow used to the sound, which is hypnotic, like an Albanian chant without the harmonies.
My thoughts wander and I’m a child again, smelling fried green sweet peppers stuffed with feta. Warm cornbread. Sage and lavender. Diesel fumes. Paraffin stoves. Melting wax. My mother’s perfume.
Our village was surrounded by mountains and lakes, and streams that tumbled over rocks and created rivers that ran to the sea. The buildings clung to the hillsides and rose from the wildflowers like ancient ruins. I don’t know if our cottage is still there. Another family probably lives there now, paying rent to Mr Berisha. I carved my initials into the walnut tree outside my bedroom window. And we marked my height on a door frame in the kitchen, a new notch for every year, next to a spot on the wall where Mama threw a saucepan at a mouse. She missed.
What other evidence might remain? Perhaps, in some dusty local government building, there will be a record of my birth, my parents’ names on a piece of paper. A signature. A stamp. Does that make it my country? My home?
When I was growing up, people cared about where you came from. Your family. Your history. People were either good or bad. Clean or stained. Trustworthy or suspicious. My mother was an only child. My father was one of four. He was named after his grandfather, who he never met, which means neither did I, but there were stories about him, passed down from one generation to the next.
