Domino

6th June 1974. Wendel Meyer was slumped in his armchair when I first came across him. He was 78 years old, fat, bald and now in the midst of a heart attack. Even though he was sleeping, his heart was pounding, through his white, dirty vest, strewn with old stains from various hot meals. Pies, beans, tea, coffee, beer. He’d smoked since he was eleven years old. His grey beard was unkempt. His head hair long and greasy. He had long since been unable to care for himself. As he died he had one heir. His nephew. He did have a will. It was with a pile of paperwork, including bank statements, utility bills, letters from his GP, junk mail, mail from insurance companies, trying to persuade him to buy life insurance, home insurance. Letters from his local MP.
His house was a complete mess. There were hundreds of old newspapers he’d kept for years. There were damp cardboard boxes full of junk. Old books and records. Up against one corner there was a small broken umbrella, next to a pile of dirty clothes, that had never seen the inside of a washing machine. Sometimes he would just buy something new, rather than wash it.
As he died, I saw him die. I saw the lights go out in his eyes. It was summer and it was hotter than usual that year. The flies were buzzing round the house constantly. He refused to open any windows but they got in somehow anyway.
A thick layer of dust was everywhere, including the large oak sideboard against one of the walls in the living room and on top of the piles of paper there. A fly was buzzing busily not too far away from his now dead body and as its wings flapped vigorously over the pile of papers, they were disturbed just that little bit that they finally tipped over and headed down the back of the sideboard. Not the whole pile you understand. Just the first ten documents, including his will. His will made his thirty-eight year old nephew his heir. He’d had a daughter but she had died of cancer ten years ago and he hadn’t spoken to his ex-wife since the day he left her in 1964.
His body lay undisturbed for three long weeks. He’d left this world with no-one, apart from me, watching over him. But I have no power to intervene. All I can do is go to the places where my influence is destined to be. I have no consciousness. I am not a woman, a man, a child, an animal or a bird. I am not a law, a machine, or a robot. I am not a predator, though I do take life. I am not death, nor am I life. I am a leaf falling from a tree. I am the straw that broke the camel’s back. I am the bridge too far. I am domino and I am coming…
 
The police finally broke the door down after numerous complaints about the smell. It was another two weeks before his nephew arrived to clear the house. He took one look at it and called in a house clearance company just to take the lot, most of it heading straight to landfill. His nephew, Andre Meyer left the house after a couple of hours trying to find his will. Frustrated and knowing that his uncle left everything to him, without the will he could not prove that his uncle had done that. I had disturbed the scene enough to conceal, what would have been a much needed windfall for him.
Andre was unemployed and drawing social security benefits to keep him going. He lived in a small one up one down terraced house, which was council owned and falling into a state of disrepair. He was underweight because he couldn’t afford to eat much. Times were tough. He had a green armchair and an old black and white television for company. He sat brooding in silence that night. He knew that his uncles will mentioned him as his heir, but proving it without the will was going to be hard. He didn’t even know which solicitor it was held with. He couldn’t rely on that solicitor whoever he was to search for him. He wouldn’t even know that his client had died. He would have to return to the house and continue the search.
That night he paced restlessly, with a beer in one hand and a roll up in the other. He would soon run out of those and he would not be able to cash his Giro until Tuesday morning. It was now Sunday evening.
Come Monday morning he woke having got three hours sleep and was in a terrible mood. He stomped angrily around his house, crashing his frying pan against the wall in the kitchen, then yelling so loud the neighbours began to shout back and hammer their fists against the wall.
As the neighbour Mohammed banged on the wall with his fist, the edge of his hand hit a nail that was sticking out of the wall. He quickly recoiled and clutched his injured hand in his other hand and cursed before realising that his daughter was stood in the doorway. He turned and looked at her and smiled, trying to set her mind at rest. He looked up at the wall trying to see the nail but he couldn’t see it. I could. It was on the floor. Because it was so small and the carpet was a dark brown colour, his poor eyesight couldn’t pick it out. But why mention it you ask? Surely it is a minor detail. Its significance shouldn’t be underestimated as it will play a role later in this story.
Mohammed headed quickly to the kitchen to wash and dress the wound. It was a deep gash and he wondered whether he would need to see a doctor. He had a small packet of plasters, but he needed something more significant. He yelled to his wife, who hurried down the stairs as his daughter shouted ‘Mum, dad’s cut himself,’ seeming a little panicked by the sight of blood coming from her father’s hand.
His wife and daughter left to go to the hospital to get his hand treated. His son Ebed, followed him soon afterward and they all waited in the waiting room for him to be seen. However, over the course of the next two weeks, Mohammed developed sepsis, which was not picked up by the doctors early enough and he passed away. Such a small thing this nail. But very significant as I said earlier.
Without his income (he was a bus driver in London), his wife struggled to get work and their two children were too young. Ebed was eleven and Shona eight. Back home in Egypt his wife Alisha had a wealthy family. Her decision to leave Egypt had upset her father greatly. But to return now would please him a great deal and he would support her and her children. So for the time being we will leave London behind and venture further afield – to Egypt.
In Egypt in 1984, Ebed has just completed his university degree. His life hasn’t gone well so far. His grandfather died six years back, leaving his entire wealth to his eldest son. His mother was then at the mercy of her older brother, who reduced her allowance down to the bare bones. He did however pay for Ebed’s education, which had led to him applying for the Egyptian diplomatic service. As he hunched over the forms to begin his application, the home telephone rang. Irritated he picked it up. His uncle. ‘Uncle,’ he said, thinking as he usually did, that he’d better be nice to him. He wasn’t a bad guy when all was said and done. He could have cut him and his family off completely, but as it stood, he was going to support his family forever. He had the money. He had been independently wealthy before he inherited his father’s wealth. He was tight with President Mubarak; one of the business elite to which the president bestowed favourable terms on every government contract and every state backed business venture. His grandfather had been the eighteenth richest person in Egypt and now his uncle was the seventh.
‘I trust you are making progress with your application to join the diplomatic service?’ he asked.
‘Yes uncle. I have just answered the first three questions and I am moving onto the fourth now.’
‘Good, good Ebed. When you’ve finished send it to me. Better still bring it to the office. I will be here all afternoon, till five.’
‘Thank you uncle,’ Ebed said. They ended the call and Ebed’s attention returned to his form. He had to concentrate hard for the next hour or so if was going to answer these questions properly. He didn’t want to get in just because his uncle told someone to let him join. He had three copies and he planned to fill it in three times, if necessary. Once you’ve committed pen to paper it would be too late and he didn’t know whether he could get a fourth form.
An hour passed and then two before he was finally pleased with what he’d done. It was time to get it to his uncle. He grabbed an A4 envelope and carefully inserted the form inside it. He then took the two pieces of card he had pre-prepared and sandwiched the form inside the two pieces to keep it from bending. He would ride over on his moped – another gift from his uncle. He fired it up and sped off across Cairo. There were several security alerts across the city today. Most days there was at least one. He drove carefully around a police unit, with their guns. He didn’t want to be stopped by them. But in avoiding them he only grabbed their attention. An officer stepped forward, putting his hand on the handle bars to hold him there.
‘Where are your papers?’ he barked at Ebed.
Ebed reached inside his bag and pulled out a wallet and showed him his ID. The officer looked at it for what seemed like ages. He then cleared him to go and he sped off again towards his uncle’s office building. But let’s reverse for a second. We missed something. While the police officer was turning to his right to stop Ebed, he missed a fella called Abdul. Abdul was heading for the airport. He was born in the US and his visa had expired three weeks ago. If he’d have been stopped that day he would have been detained for weeks in an Egyptian jail. As it was he was soon sitting next to a pretty American-Egyptian woman, called Dali. They were both on a plane to Boston. Abdul was also an American-Egyptian who was born in Boston. They started off their conversation on that very subject and talked for a couple of hours before falling asleep, as the conversation ran dry. By 7 am they were on their final descent and landed at Boston airport having exchanged numbers. ‘I will definitely call you, I promise,’ he told her. And he meant it. If this was someone he could marry, his father would be very happy he’d found a good Muslim girl.
‘I will hold you to that,’ she joked. The instinct was to lean over and kiss her cheek. But he wasn’t sure. She was unchaperoned. That did mean she was from a liberal family, but still he hesitated.
By the time he got home, he was ready to sleep. He was exhausted.
He slept for eight hours in total before waking to a fresh cup of strong coffee, prepared by his mother. ‘Morning Abdul,’ she said. ‘Did you do everything you wanted to do?’
‘Yes, mom. I also met a nice girl who lives in Boston.’
‘A good Muslim girl?’ she said.
‘Yes, of course,’ he grinned. ‘I will ring her tomorrow or maybe Friday. Don’t want to be too keen, or I’ll scare her off.’
‘Good, good,’ his mom said and smiled a wide smile. This was good news for her. ‘I need to get to work,’ she said. ‘There’s some food I cooked earlier in the fridge.’ His mom Dina put her coat on over her nurses uniform. She was a cardiac nurse, who worked full time at Boston West hospital. As she left, the wind gusted right as she stepped into the street outside her house. She hadn’t done up her coat as one of the pockets at the bottom, tipped out all the contents, including a dollar note, which she tried to grab before it disappeared down the street. She ran after it for a while, before seeing it get sucked under a parked car. It was a dollar. No great loss. And she would be late if she spent any more time trying to recover it.
The car it went under was moved two hours later and Big John, stepped forward to claim it. He reached down, his back aching having spent many nights sleeping in doorways. He grabbed it and unfolded it. ‘A dollar,’ he croaked, his voice damaged from smoking strong tobacco for many years. He was a large man. 6’1’ and bulky in his early fifties. He’d been homeless for many years and was known to most people in the neighbourhood. Some liked him, some didn’t. He headed across the street to a café he sometimes went to. In fact it was opposite his favoured sleeping place, in a doorway of an old shop that had closed down years before and had never been rented since.
He entered and put his dollar on the counter. The young girl said, ‘Coffee?’
‘Yeah. Three sugars,’ he instructed. While he waited he took a seat at a table by the window. The girl brought it over.
‘You smell dude,’ came a male voice from the table next to him. The waitress glanced over and scowled at him. She didn’t particularly feel all that comfortable around Big John, but she certainly felt a little defensive about people who hurl abuse at homeless people.
‘What’d you say?’ he asked the younger man, dressed in a jogging suit with a bright red cap on.
‘I said you smell dude,’ he replied and laughed. Big John got up and stood over him. The man also got up. Even though John was big, this guy was equally as big and a lot younger. John shoved him, hard and he went flying backwards, hitting the waitress who also flew backwards and smacked her head on the counter. John, seeing what he’d done turned and fled.
The waitress, a forty year old woman called Beth, staggered to her feet as her colleague rushed forward. ‘Beth,’ he said. ‘Are you okay?’ her friend was younger than her, black and wearing a bright red apron. ‘Call an ambulance!’ she shouted at the café owner, seeing that she was bleeding heavily and was barely able to communicate. He turned and grabbed the handset off the cradle and dialed 911.
The ambulance crew entered the café, ten minutes later and tried to speak to her, asking for her name and what day it was. But Beth was groggy and couldn’t focus enough to reply. She just mumbled something unintelligible. The police arrived after the ambulance staff. The two officers grabbed the man who was pushed and put a cuff on him. ‘You’ll be staying here until we get to grips with what happened,’ one of the officers told him.
‘I’ll tell you what happened,’ the younger waitress said. ‘He insulted a homeless man. Told him he smelled and John, the homeless guy, shoved him into Beth and Beth went backwards into the counter.’
‘What homeless man?’ the officer asked.
‘He usually sleeps in the doorway over there,’ she pointed across the street. ‘We call him Big John. He’s about six foot and big and black. He comes in here most days. He’s never caused trouble before.’
‘Okay,’ the officer said as he reached for his radio to call it in, as Beth was moved carefully to a stretcher and was carried outside to the ambulance. The driver switched on the siren and headed off to the nearest ER. In the ambulance, she began to speak a little more clearly.
‘Is Big John okay?’ she asked.
‘Don’t worry about him right now. Can you tell me what your name is, your full name?’ the female paramedic asked her.
‘Beth Salter,’ she said in a quiet voice.
‘What day of the week is it?’
‘Wednesday,’ she replied.
‘Who’s the President?’
‘Reagan. I think it is,’ she said. ‘I don’t really follow politics,’ she admitted.
‘That’s okay,’ the paramedic said. They arrived at the hospital and she was rushed through to the ER for more tests. ‘Possible concussion. She was unable to respond to questions for around ten minutes, but she seems to be making progress again now.’ The paramedic left after some discussion and paperwork and headed back out for the next call. Beth went through some tests that afternoon, which I won’t explain in detail here. Suffice it to say, that her sister arrived shortly afterward and was sat by her side for a couple of hours before visiting hours were up.
‘You can come and stay with me until you’re all clear,’ she told her. After two days under observation, Beth was able to walk out of the hospital and decided to take up her sister Sarah’s offer. Sarah was two years younger than her and lived with her husband and two teenage daughters, Constance who was sixteen and Kendle who was fourteen. Kendle was pretty, with porcelain white skin and jet black long hair. As her aunty came in, she gave her a big hug.
‘How ya’ feelin’ Aunt Beth? We all thought you were done for,’ she said.
‘So did I. I can’t remember anything about what happened, but the doctors said that’s normal. I remember going to work and I remember the first hour and then it just goes blank.’
‘Come in and sit down,’ Sarah said. ‘I’ll make some tea. I’ve been to your place and got you some clothes and toiletries. I put them in the small room,’ she explained.
‘Oh good. I love the small room,’ Beth said with a smile.
‘I know. You’ve always loved that room. Why do you love it so much?’ Kendle asked.
‘It’s cosy and bright. It just has a nice feel, a nice atmosphere.’
‘I agree. If I wasn’t so in love with your father, I’d sleep there,’ Sarah joked.
 
That night Beth dreamt a strange dream. Since she’d banged her head she’d had three strange dreams, with images she didn’t really understand. Just shapes, bright lights and a swooshing sound she couldn’t identify. Almost like the wind moving through a tree. She woke and rubbed her forehead. She had a headache still. It hadn’t gone since she’d come to in hospital later that evening when it happened. She wondered about what had happened to Big John. Whether he’d been arrested and taken to jail or not. She tried to think what kind of charges he would face. Assault and battery perhaps? That little jock shit has a lot to answer for. He should have known better. It’s unkind to criticise a homeless man for not being clean. Where was he supposed to wash himself and clean his clothes? There was nowhere near the café, she was sure of that. Perhaps she should have done more to help him?
She lifted herself slowly out of bed, still feeling exhausted and headed down stairs. Sarah greeted her.
‘Hi there,’ she said, dressed in her bed clothes with a light blue fluffy dressing down wrapped around her. ‘How you feeling?’
‘Head ache still. And my muscles ache as well for some reason. I feel exhausted, but I don’t feel like sleeping either.’ She sat down at the breakfast bar.
‘Coffee?’ Sarah asked.
‘No chance. My head feels like it’s going to explode. Pass me those painkillers will you?’ she said pointing across the kitchen where she’d left them on the side last night. They were prescribed by the ER doctor, so they were a little stronger than over-the-counter drugs she usually gets. She popped out two from their blisters and downed them, one at a time and then rested her head on her arms on the breakfast bar and closed her eyes.
‘Are you going back to sleep?’ Sarah asked.
‘Maybe,’ she mumbled back. As Sarah prepared breakfast for her family, Beth slowly fell unconscious and began to slip off the breakfast bar, until she fell over onto the floor. It took a few seconds for Sarah to notice, thinking she had stood up and headed out the room, before noticing her hand on the floor sticking out from the other side of the bar.
‘Oh my God, Beth,’ she said and rushed over. She turned her over and felt her pulse before jumping up and grabbing the phone off the wall and dialling 911.
The ambulance crew came through the front door and following Sarah’s directions headed over to Beth who was still on the floor. They took her pulse.
‘She hit her head a couple days back. She went to the ER and was discharged. But she woke with a headache this morning and then just collapsed.’
‘Okay, we can handle it from here.’ They picked her up and lay her on the gurney and took her outside and loaded her up into the ambulance. Sarah grabbed her car keys and quickly explained to her girls what had happened and left them to get ready for school. Her husband was upstairs getting ready for work. As Sarah arrived she was kept out of the operating room. She would have to have surgery to relieve pressure on her brain. Sarah sobbed while she waited in the corridor, before a nurse asked her to wait in the small waiting room, with eight chairs round it and a coffee table with magazines on it. On the side was a boiler with jars of instant coffee and a small fridge with one small carton of milk in it. Sarah guessed this was going to take some time. Then the door opened and her husband Ed walked in.
‘Hi,’ she said.
‘The girls told me where you were,’ he said, before sitting down and grabbing her hand and kissing it. ‘What’s the latest?’
‘She’s in surgery, but that’s all I know. The nurse said the surgeon will come speak to us when the operation is done.’ She wiped a tear from her eye and they both sat in silence for a while, the conversation drying up. Sarah didn’t feel like mindless chatter for the sake of it. Her anxiety was sky high and after a while she stood up and walked out of the waiting room and up the corridor and peered through the little window. ‘I can’t see anything,’ she said partially to herself.
Her husband stood up and peered round the doorway of the waiting room.
Sarah turned back to him and walked back to the room and sat back down. ‘I couldn’t see anything. I think you have to go through another door to see.’
 
Three horrible hours passed. It was mid-day and Sarah and her husband were still waiting for news. They’d had the waiting room to themselves for most of that time until eventually a doctor dressed in scrubs entered the room. He was tall and thin, in his sixties. ‘I’m Mr Bentall,’ he said. ‘I’ve just finished Beth’s operation. She is still unconscious. We cannot at this stage say whether she’ll survive or not. If she does pull through the next twenty-four hours is the critical period. She had a serious bleed in her brain from banging her head yesterday. If and when she comes round we’ll put her through a few cognitive tests to see where she’s at as to brain function. There is one more thing you need to know. She is pregnant. Three months or so is my guess. The baby should be unaffected at this stage, but only time will tell.’
‘Oh my God,’ Sarah said and began to cry.
‘Who would the father be Sarah? I didn’t think she had a boyfriend,’ Peter, her husband asked.
‘There was someone she mentioned but I didn’t think it was serious. I always assumed she was careful – you know, taking precautions.’
Her sister and her sister’s husband sat silently in shock. After a while Sarah spoke. ‘We haven’t told mum and dad. I will go call them now,’ she said and walked off into the corridor while Peter stayed put.
 
Beth did recover and we pick her again a year later. She’d had her child, a healthy boy called Jamie and her rehabilitation was slow but steady. Her brain function wasn’t great and she’d need a lot of input to help bring up her boy. Her boyfriend had been there every step of the way, but this whole saga had taken a heavy toll. Her boyfriend had been working part time at his law firm, but was poised to go back full time, as Beth and her sister and her mom, were all helping her out with Jamie. But in her mind things felt foggy. She’d kept it quiet, but she felt nothing inside, as if all her love and compassion had gone. She’d had to learn to pretend to be the old Beth, but her family knew she wasn’t the same.
She was planning to look after Jamie by herself for the first time that day. It was a big step. Her family nervously accepted that she would be fine. Her mom suggested taking Jamie down to the park in the city centre, so that’s what she did. It took twenty minutes to get down there. She walked around the lake and then stopped at a quiet spot where the ducks and swans were gathered. She parked up the pram next to a bench and put the brake on. She sat down on the bench next to the pram. She had short legs which dangled off the edge. Her mind was quiet. Numb even. She couldn’t feel anything. She didn’t feel she had bonded with her baby. She reached down to the break on the pram and unlocked it and then sat facing forward watching the birds feed and squabble, as the pram slowly began to roll down the slope to the water. It picked up speed as it got closer to the water and Beth didn’t react. She just kept looking forward at the birds. The pram hit the water and then must have hit a rock or a piece of concrete and tipped forward and turned upside down. Jamie would be drowning right now, but she just sat and didn’t react at all. From behind her a man in his fifties belted past her.
‘What the hell is wrong with you?’ he yelled as he dashed into the water and picked the pram up and turning it the right way up as he lifted it. He immediately checked inside the pram, to see if the baby was still there. He wasn’t. He was under the water. He put his hands into the water and got down onto his knees and began to feel around to see if he could grab the baby before it was too late. He found him quickly and lifted him up out of the water and ran back up the slope and put the baby down on the bench. He was breathing. By this time more people had arrived.
‘I’ve called an ambulance,’ a woman told the man who’d rescued the baby.
‘And the police,’ he said. ‘This woman has attempted to kill her baby.’ He pointed at her. Beth looked up and stared blankly at him. She sat in silence, barely reacting to what was happening around her.
 
It took hours of police interviews and inquiries before the man who had pulled Jamie out of the water, was able to return home. His clothes were still wet and he was freezing cold. As he returned home, his wife hugged him. ‘Frank. How are you feeling?’ she asked.
‘Cold and pissed off. There was clearly something very wrong with that woman. I didn’t see her unlock the brake on the pram, but she must have done. No-one else was sat with her. Anyway, I need a hot shower and a change of clothes.’
‘Okay,’ his wife said. She went to the kitchen and put the kettle on. ‘Do you want a hot drink?’ she bellowed after him as he climbed the stairs.
‘Yes please,’ he called back. Once he’d got in the shower and the hot clean water hit his body, he began to sob. Walter his name was. He began to sob uncontrollably. He would have to pull himself together before he went back down stairs, but people can often tell when someone’s been crying. Your eyes give you away and he didn’t want any awkward questions from his wife, Mary who was now sat downstairs in the kitchen waiting to talk to him about what had happened. They’d already had a brief conversation over the phone, while he waited to give his statement.
He climbed down the stairs with fresh dry clothes on, his hair still wet from the shower. His wife hugged him. If she had noticed he’d been crying, she hadn’t said anything to him yet.
‘I want to go and see her,’ he said. ‘Once she’s been processed I will try and get a visitation order. She wasn’t right you know. She had this blank look on her face, as if she didn’t know what she was doing. Just these empty eyes, staring into space. She looked right through me. It wouldn’t surprise me if she had some kind of breakdown or brain disease.’
‘That might be a good idea. Get it all clear in your mind, what happened,’ his wife said in support.
‘The police wouldn’t tell me anything. They just thanked me for pulling that baby out of the water and that they’d be in touch if I’m needed in court.’
 
A few days passed and Walter became quite withdrawn. He didn’t feel good about the whole thing. He’d expected, as did his wife, to feel good about saving a baby’s life. But those good feelings didn’t come. He was anxious to see her. The order came through about mid-day and he was granted permission to see her, the following week.
As he arrived at the prison, the tall intimidating fences and guard towers, made him feel uncomfortable. He looked up at a guard on one of the towers, who was holding a shotgun, as he walked through into the first yard which led to a double door, with a guard standing there. One side of the door was propped open, as visitors filed past in single file to be searched. No-one was allowed to take bags through to the visiting room, but he had no bag with him. He wandered into a long corridor, behind about ten people, plus three guards, one at each end of the corridor and one in the middle, who was facing outwards, inspecting the passing people one by one. Looking at them up and down, with deep suspicion, which is why they’re there. Any one of these visitors could be smuggling in contraband. Drugs or cash. He got to the end of the corridor and turned right into an open room, with little tables surrounded by chairs. Four chairs per table. He saw Beth towards the back. He didn’t wave, he just walked over and sat down. ‘Hey,’ he said. She didn’t reply.
‘How you feeling?’ he asked. ‘Do you know who I am?’
‘You saved my baby,’ she said, in a strange whining tone, like she had a speech impediment, which she did – the result of her head injury.
‘I have to ask. Why did you do it?’ he said, not wanting to skirt around the issue.
She sat silently staring at him. He couldn’t tell whether she was offended by his question – whether she was going to get upset and send him away. Eventually she spoke.
‘I don’t know. They say I could plead out because of my disability. I think that was it. My disability,’ she explained. She had no real reason it seemed. At least one she could give him readily.
The conversation continued to be difficult and Walter was running out of things to say. She had little to say, mainly staying silent, with long pauses in between sentences, and answering questions. As the session came to an end a loud voice came from behind him as one of the prisoners bellowed at her young daughter. Walter looked round to see what the commotion was. As he turned a young eight year old girl ran over to him and hid behind him.
‘It’s okay,’ he said shielding her from the woman, presumably her mother who rushed over to him and started shouting insults right into his face.
‘You stupid cunt. What are you a pervert! Get out of my way,’ she shouted, as guards grabbed her and dragged her out of the visiting room, as she continued to scream and shout in an absolute fury.
‘What was that about?’ a woman who was sat on the next table said.
‘I don’t know,’ Walter replied. He turned and lent down to speak with the girl. She was pretty, but scruffily dressed, her long black hair tangled up as if it hadn’t been brushed or washed for a while. She looked like she was being neglected. She was probably being looked after by her father, Walter thought. He looked around for her parent or guardian. He had no clue what he or she looked like, or whether they were even here. He lent down again. ‘Look,’ he said and pulled a chocolate bar from his pocket and presented it to her. She grabbed as if she hadn’t eaten for a while, but instead of eating it, she shoved it quickly into her pocket and then looked back behind her to see if anyone saw. Then a large man approached them.
‘Come on Ester. It’s time to go,’ he said, in a deep voice. Walter stared at him for a second, as he glared back. He looked very unpleasant. And that was it. Visit over.
 
Ester played quietly over the other side of the room, where her father was drinking heavily. He was so drunk, his eyes were closing and opening again, as he tried to stay awake. Ester watched him closely. She would be relieved if he fell asleep and if he did fall asleep she could eat her chocolate bar in peace. If he saw her eating it, he would be angry with her. He slowly fell asleep as she watched and waited. Once he began to snore, she got up and crept past him to head to the dining room where she would hide and secretly eat her chocolate. As she passed him, he woke suddenly.
‘Where are you going?’ he said in a deep gravelly voice which made her jump. She quickly turned and hid the bar behind her back. ‘What have you got you little bitch?’ He didn’t miss anything, despite being out of it. He was a biker and worked as a bike mechanic. He also pumped iron every day. He’d pumped iron every day since he was sixteen and he first went to prison. He also regularly abused steroids which made him volatile and prone to fits of extreme violence.
‘Nothing,’ she lied. She so desperately wanted that chocolate but now it looked like he would take it off her.
‘Come here,’ he commanded, his voice letting her know there was no option. She walked over slowly. As soon as she was in reach he grabbed her arm and pulled it from behind her back, revealing her little hand clinging onto the chocolate bar for dear life. He wrenched it from her hand and put it next to him on the other side of his chair. ‘Where do get it from?’
She shook her head, unwilling to tell him.
‘You better fucking tell me!’ he shouted and grabbed her throat, his hands big enough to crush her throat with his one hand.
‘A man at the prison,’ she said. He continued to strangle her, tighter and tighter, as she squirmed and choked. Her face was going red and she was trying to prise his fingers off her neck, digging her nails in, until she started to lose consciousness. When he thought she was dead he let go and allowed her lifeless body drop to the floor right there at his feet. He reached over to the small table next to him picked up his glass with whiskey in it and downed what was there. He picked up the chocolate bar and opened it and ate it, discarding the packet on the floor. He then poured another drink, took one sip, then fell asleep.
 
‘What have you done?’ came a cry from his mother who had arrived home after work. She lent down and put her fingers on Esters neck where her pulse would be. ‘She has a pulse. Thank God,’ she said as she walked over to the phone and picked it up, dialing 911.
‘What?’ her father mumbled as he roused himself, as best he could. A couple of hours had passed by while he slept and Ester lay unconscious on the floor next to him.
 
She was taken into care after that. Not even her grandmother could have her, because she lived with the man who had tried to kill her. And we have to leave it there as we fast forward to 1993; nine years later. We leave the many strands of many, countless stories. Threads of trouble and strife, joy and fulfillment. We must bob and weave through the years to find her again. Ester, who now called herself Angel and her beautiful face and body she used to earn a very good living as an escort for a top of the line escort agency, in Manhattan New York. Although she was messed up, she did get some enjoyment from the work – well, more the money. She felt like time was catching up with her. Like she was burning out. Her last three clients had all been abusive towards her and her boss was unsympathetic. She said that’s the job. But she wanted those men barred from the service. She didn’t feel strong enough to argue, so she just accepted it. But she was aware of another service, called The Cats Whiskers, where the boss was said to be more willing to prevent abuse of his girls. He was Carl, an Italian American, New Jersey boy, born and bred. He’d asked to come work for her, a couple of weeks back. Came up to her in the bar of the hotel she was in, after seeing a client. He knew a prostitute when he saw one. At first she thought he was going to hire her. But he handed her a card and told her that Caterina, her current boss, was no good and she should come work for him. He’d give her a bigger cut as well. She had his card in her bag, which she now was fishing for in her Gucci, limited edition hand bag. It was cream and black and beautiful. Her favourite bag – not that she was a collector. She had four designer bags at home and a couple of cheap ones that she’d take when she wasn’t working and just needed groceries. She would wear sports gear on her days off. Tonight she had a very special client. She just called him Abdul. But she knew he was a Saudi official who was very high up in the Saudi government. He had security staff who guarded him round the clock. He would regularly attend meetings at the United Nations Headquarters in Manhattan. He had seen her five times now and didn’t seem to be getting bored with her. He was a billionaire, profiting from Saudi oil. She wondered sometimes if he would make her as his mistress, paying her for her exclusive attention, not seeing anyone else and putting her up in a luxury apartment somewhere. She knew he also had several wives back in Saudi Arabia. But he very rarely brought her with him when he visited America.
She had brought a new sexy cocktail dress a couple of days ago, specifically to see Abdul. The idea of only having one exclusive client, did appeal to her and she liked him enough to try it out, see if it could work. But he hadn’t made any promises at all.
She realised half way through the afternoon that she didn’t have the moisturiser she liked. She grabbed the empty bottle off the shelf and chucked it in the small white bin, she kept in the bathroom. She put her shoes on. It was mid-summer and New York baked. She fished her shades from her bag and headed out. The pharmacist was a five minute walk. As she passed a bodega she noticed a little sign for the Lotto. A jackpot of $400m. What she could do with $400m dollars. She paused for a second then entered the shop and asked for a ticket. She paid and folded it into her purse and left again, weaving through some elderly women who got in her way. It was as busy on the sidewalk as ever. She didn’t mind too much. She was used to it, but old ladies did irritate her, because they were so unaware of their surrounding; that people were struggling to get past them. They would just carry on oblivious to everyone.
By the time she got back it was 3.30 and she took off her trainers at the entrance to her apartment and walked straight through to her bathroom, to carry on with her make-up routine, including adding moisturiser to her beautiful face. The lotto was due to be drawn tonight.
She arrived at the hotel where Abdul was staying. Where he always stayed. It was a top of line hotel, which didn’t have rooms – it had apartments. Large luxurious suites, with room service and maids who would arrive every day to clean and change the bed and clear away the rubbish. The concierge welcomed her.
‘Hi Miss Angel,’ he said in his thick Eastern European accent.
‘Stephan,’ she replied cheerily. ‘How are you?’
‘Living the dream,’ he said with a smile. All the staff there had a good comradely going. The kind where they would all gossip about the rich bastards that stayed there, especially the ones who misbehaved. Even though they were nice to her, she wasn’t exactly one of them. She was part of the gossip. She didn’t know whether they knew she was an escort for sure, but it was a sure bet that they did. She didn’t like it, but knew there was nothing to be said to put it right. Because they were right. She wasn’t a mistress or a wife or a girlfriend. She was an employee. An employee on the outside. Someone hired to have sex with rich clients. She’d never had another client who stayed here. That would muddy the waters somewhat, with those who might guess what she did for a living. But when it came down to it, she didn’t care. For now she needed to focus on her client. Make him happy.
After eating in an exclusive restaurant they returned at 11 pm and immediately went to bed. Abdul, as a Muslim, still remained T-total, but didn’t mind committing adultery. So Ester was always sober when she was with him. He had told her from the first time they met that he did not want her to drink and explained why. Ester had never met a Muslim before. She knew nothing about them. She hadn’t even heard of Islam and all she knew about it now was that he was a Muslim. She had no inclination to pop down to the library and look it up. It wasn’t important to her at all.
As they settled down in bed, Ester remembered her Lotto ticket and switched on the TV. Abdul didn’t like gambling, but that didn’t stop her scrolling through to find the result. After a while she realised, having checked it again and again, that she’d got enough numbers to have won something big. Not the jackpot, but something substantial. She whooped and celebrated, but she wouldn’t know until she’d rung the company to find out how much she’d won.
‘Well done Angel,’ Abdul said, trying to feel enthusiastic for her.
‘This means I can pay for my training to become an airline pilot,’ she said.
‘An airline pilot?’ Abdul was surprised. ‘In my country women can’t even drive a car, let alone a passenger jet. Does this mean you will stop doing escort work?’ he inquired.
‘Don’t worry. We can still see each other. We can be exclusive.’
‘That sounds good. I like that.’
‘Yeah. And the first thing I’ll do when I fly one of those jumbo jets is ram it into the IRS building,’ she said and laughed.
‘Why? Do you owe them money?’
‘I don’t, but they think I do. They know what I do is a cash business, so they think I have a deposit box somewhere, stuffed full of money, but I don’t.’
 
She didn’t manage to get away from Abdul until noon and she was anxious about calling the lottery company and finding out what she’d won. But I’m afraid we have to let her go on her merry way, because we need to now to switch back to Abdul. It is his story that we’re now interested in. His story which will lead us where we need to go.
The twin towers still loomed impressively over New York at that time and Abdul was often there working with various people to sort out the political processes needed to keep the Americans in the pockets of the Saudi’s. It was February and Abdul headed for the World Trade Centre to meet with various diplomats and oil executives as they renewed a deal with the state oil company. He reached the double doors and went through to an enormous lobby, which led to a bank of lifts on one side and an escalator on the other. Abdul and his entourage walked swiftly through to the lift and travelled up to the eighth floor. They left the lift, with Abdul grabbing his thawb clothing at the edges to keep it in place. He folded it over with his hand and held onto it as he walked through to an office, with a glass door and a security guard. The guard looked him up and down before letting him pass. He’d seen him many times and recognised him and his men, which meant he was unconcerned about letting him through. As he sat down in the chief executives large office, his sat back on the large sofa feeling relaxed and confident. He generally got what he wanted in these meetings – the Western executives not in a particularly good negotiating position with the Saudi’s. The Saudi’s had choices when it came to who they did distribution and extraction engineering deals with. There were several very capable contractors to choose from. The coffee arrived and was set down on the table in front of them. Then a loud thud was heard.
‘What the hell was that?’ the American said. They all waited and listened for a few seconds.
‘Earthquake?’ Abdul said. The executive stood up and went to the window and looked down at Manhattan. He then returned to his seat and picked up the phone.
‘I’ll find out,’ he said. As he lifted the receiver the alarms began to sound, which meant the building would have to be evacuated. He put the receiver back down. ‘I guess that’s our answer. Everyone has to leave now,’ he said as he stood up and put on his coat. Everyone followed suit and as the men entered the corridor, all the other staff were leaving. Abdul’s body guards forced their way forward grabbing his charge tightly around the arm, not wanting to get separated. The body guards moved people aside as they rushed through. In a few minutes they were back downstairs and heading out.
The car was down in the car park, but they were prevented from going down there.
 
It took several hours to get a clear picture of what had happened that day. The news had already told the world that a large bomb had been detonated downstairs in the basement. Abdul watched the news, while drinking coffee back in his apartment. ‘This is unacceptable,’ he told his staff. ‘We could have all been killed. Is this one of ours? Islamic terrorists? I wish to know!’ he shouted as his staff scuttled away to make calls back home.
Several weeks passed before Abdul returned to Saudi Arabia to brief the King on various matters of state and to return to his family for a break from international politics. He walked in and greeted his wife, kissing her and then turning to his children who he hugged. ‘I have a meeting this afternoon, so I will be getting showered and changed and will leave soon.’
‘When will you be back?’ she asked with a look of disappointment and stress across her face. She waits weeks, sometimes months to see her husband, then when he arrives home he leaves again.
‘I will be back to eat with you all, so don’t worry,’ he said, with a little irritation. He loved his wife and kids, but he was a very focused and ambitious man who, to be frank, wanted to meet up with the Al-Qaeda leader who ordered the bombing of the World Trade Centre – a man called Bin Laden. Osama. He was in the country for a short period and Abdul wanted to question him. It had taken some doing to arrange this, and he wasn’t going to miss it. Bin Laden’s right hand man will be there also. He wanted to look them in the eye. He wanted to discover why and what they might do next. He wasn’t going to keep visiting the Twin Towers in New York, if it was going to be a primary target of this group. He couldn’t shut him down either, because he was being shielded by the security forces and presumably the King himself.
The wait was tense to say the least. Meeting with terrorists wasn’t something Abdul Al-Sheikh, liked to do. He was already aware that these men with this ideology were gaining respect among the Islamic zealots, and the King wasn’t exactly opposing them outright. It was a tacit approval, unspoken, only done via the absence of action against them.
Abdul walked past the security staff, walking quickly. He was flanked by his security advisor and close protection body guard, dressed in a smart suit, with a hand gun holstered inside his jacket. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed flanked Osama. As Abdul walked in they stood up and Khalid smiled a sickly smile. Osama remained stern not smiling as they shook hands. Abdul’s body guard stood at the back of the room, just behind his charge, his hands crossed in front of his body. He stared blankly forward, not wanting to make eye contact with the two men in front of him.
‘Welcome, As-salāmu ʿalaykum,’ Abdul said. They returned the greeting.
‘Now, I have great respect for you Osama. Your role in the Afghan war was vital in defending our Muslim brothers from the invading Infidels of the Soviet Union. But, I wish to know what you plans are. The bomb you set off at the World Trade Centre. I was in the building. And I understand the purpose of that bomb was to topple one building into the other.’
‘Yes,’ Osama said.
‘I need to know whether you will try again, because if you are I will no longer hold meetings there,’ Abdul explained. A moment of silence followed before Osama leant over to Khalid and whispered something in his ear.
‘I cannot say,’ Osama said.
‘You cannot say?’ Abdul said. Even though these two men in front of him, were among the most dangerous men in Saudi Arabia, Abdul did not fear them. ‘Does the King know your plans?’
Again some discussion with Khalid before he replied. ‘I cannot say,’ he said.
‘What you cannot say because you don’t know, or you cannot say because your conversations with the King are classified?’
‘I cannot say, because I do not know,’ he replied. Abdul paused. He was angry.
‘Well, if your plan is to bring down the twin towers, you will need more explosives. Bigger ones. What are you going to do, get hold of a nuclear weapon? Fly a jumbo jet into them? What?’ he asked, not expecting a direct reply. But the two men then looked at each other. Abdul could see he’d hit on something which was now peaking their interest. They looked distracted. And there it was. The idea was there. An idea he’d subliminally repeated from the call girl he liked. He wasn’t even aware of it, but he had set in motion, what I desire to happen. You may disagree with it, but I am a cold force, not hot. A dispassionate voice, which whispers into the ears of my antagonists. Was it Ester’s father, who abused her, who set the train in motion? Or was it the fly that lost the last will and testament of Wendel Meyer, which set off this long and twisted journey that has led to this moment? Was it the lost dollar bill that got found by Big John? This moment which would shock and change the world forever?
But this story doesn’t end here. It’s only 1993. There are now eight years before 9/11. Do I veer off in new directions, before landing once more in the mind of Osama bin Laden?
 
2001: Bin Laden and his followers are waiting. There are only a few minutes left before the flights that they have hijacked take off. They send the women out of the room and tune in their satellite TV into the news channel and wait. They nervously joke and laugh amongst themselves. The domino has landed here on September 11th 2001. They have waited years for this. For some true retribution. To start Allah’s blessed work to strike against the Infidels and the Great Satan, America. Four planes were hijacked. Two crashed into the twin towers of the World Trade Centre. One was brought down by passengers and crew. One flew into the Pentagon. They cheered as the first of the footage started to come through to the news channels. Just what looks like a small hole in the side of one of the towers; black smoke billowing from it. Then the second hits the second tower. They cheer and call Allah Akbar. ‘Will they come down though?’ Osama asked his followers. The room went quiet as they waited to see. They also needed to see what had happened to the other two hijacked planes. Will these two hit their targets?
The wars that followed have been numerous and long. Hundreds of thousands of people have lost their lives. And with all that death you would think that it would have purpose. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn’t? Maybe it’s just senseless violence? The brutal regime of the Caliphate of ISIS is now history. It has gone. It has been defeated. The Afghan war continues. The insurgencies continue. The terror attacks across the world continue. A higher purpose is not yet clear. But my work is far from ended and my purpose forever restless for more carnage.