The next day Vural texted again.
I am best hope for you. Do not forget.
Abraham deleted the message and was dressing a wound when Saad appeared and told him to get some instruments and drugs together, whatever he could find, and join him upstairs – and quickly, they had maybe half an hour. A straightforward procedure, a caesarean section for a mother whose cord had prolapsed, and no nurses anywhere because your fellow devils keep beating them for one bullshit infringement or another.
The woman was on her own, and terrified, under her veil. They shouldn’t have been treating her, but there were no female doctors left, and without treatment the baby would die.
‘So why do you hate women?’
Saad spoke in English, and the shock of hearing it and the abruptness of the question caused Abraham to stop and look up. Saad continued to prepare the anaesthetic with the total concentration that he seemed to bring to everything.
‘I don’t hate women.’
‘You all do. What scares you?’
‘I’m not scared. Not by that.’
‘Because you are different. Of course.’
For a good minute Abraham thought carefully about his reply. It was only vanity to worry what Saad thought of him. Or anyone but God. If an airstrike killed him tomorrow and the world knew him as an evil man who joined ISIS to be with his daughter, so be it. But to be straight with one person? God, the release. Like a confession. Let Saad be his priest.
‘I’m not one of them.’
Saad glanced up at him.
‘You are with them, you are one of them.’
‘I’m here for a reason.’
‘Fuck your reason. Your reason is the problem.’
‘I’m a Christian.’
Saad’s hands stopped doing what they were doing and without looking at Abraham he shook his head.
‘Now I have heard everything.’
‘My daughter was poisoned by these animals. I came to bring her back.’
Saad was still shaking his head, eyes wide.
‘I had to join them. At a checkpoint. They were going to shoot me.’
‘She needs to be completely clean.’
‘And I’m not a doctor. I’m a pharmacist.’
‘You’re a Christian pharmacist.’
‘I trained as a doctor. But I never qualified.’
‘Anything else?’
‘That’s it.’
‘I’m going to go into the spine.’
‘Because it’s quicker?’
‘And to save anaesthetic.’ Then in Arabic, ‘Please, turn on your side.’
Together they helped the woman and Saad ran his fingers along her vertebrae. There was another reason he liked working with Saad, Abraham realized. He felt like a student again. He was learning.
Saad said nothing until the injection was done. Then he straightened up and told the woman that everything was fine and he would operate in five minutes.
‘Is she worth saving?’
At first Abraham thought he meant the woman lying between them.
Was Sofia worth saving? It was a good question. If he was to rescue one person from Raqqa how far down the list of the deserving would she come?
‘She’s my daughter.’
‘You do know there’s no way out? This is a black hole. No light escapes.’
‘People get out.’
‘Most don’t. I didn’t.’
‘You should try.’
‘Ibrahim – is that your name?’
‘Abraham.’
‘Of course. Abraham. My wife died before the occupation. Assad killed her. When the devils arrived I stayed because I figured they couldn’t be worse and then I stayed because there were only four surgeons left in the whole city and now I stay because there’s just me. So I will die here, like the thousands and thousands who cannot leave. If you find a way to leave, go. Take your daughter with you if you can. Save her soul if there is anything left to be saved. I am sorry for your pain but next to the pain of Raqqa it is a cut, a graze, a bite from a mosquito.’
Abraham looked at his feet and nodded. Tell the truth and it got reflected right back at you. A bad man he might not be, but how far from a good one?
Saad reached over the woman and touched Abraham on the arm.
‘Nothing is right. It is all impossible. I think sometimes the only good I do is save people’s lives so they can be killed some other way. We didn’t create this place.’
Abraham pinched his eyes closed, and saw there a million souls in pain, without hope of peace or even rest. How could he leave? It would be like fleeing a burning building past the outstretched hands of those about to burn.
When he opened his eyes, Saad was pricking the woman’s abdomen with a pin.
‘Will you teach me?’
‘Teach you what?’
‘If I stay, will you teach me? To be a doctor.’
‘I don’t need doctors. I need pharmacists.’
Okay, thought Abraham. I can live with that.