Oceanic Read Online Free Page B

from the fiercest sunlight. He carried water from the drinking tap on the other side of the soccer ground and sprinkled it over the soil four times a day. Nothing happened, though. The seeds lay dormant, the land would not accept them.
    Three weeks after Shahin’s departure, Alex had his interview, and left. A week later, Tran followed. Ali started sleeping through the heat of the day, waking just in time to join the queue for the evening meal, then playing cards with Rakesh and his friends until dawn.
    By the end of his sixth month, Ali felt a taint of bitterness creeping in beneath the numbness and boredom. He wasn’t a thief or a murderer, he’d committed no crime. Why couldn’t these people set him free to work, to fend for himself instead of taking their charity, to prepare himself for his new life?
    One night, tired of the endless card game, Ali wandered out from Rakesh’s hut earlier than usual. One of the guards, a woman named Cheryl, was standing outside her office, smoking. Ali murmured a greeting to her as he passed; she was not one of the friendly ones, but he tried to be polite to everyone.
    “Why don’t you just go home?” she said.
    Ali paused, unsure whether to dignify this with a response. He’d long ago learned that most of the guards’ faces became stony if he tried to explain why he’d left his village; somewhere, somehow it had been drummed into them that nothing their prisoners said could be believed.
    “Nobody invited you here,” she said bluntly. “You want to live in a civilized country? Go home and build one for yourself. You’ve got a war back there? My ancestors fought wars, they died for their freedom. What do you expect – five hundred years of progress to be handed to you on a plate? Nobody owes you a comfortable life. Go home and earn it.”
    Ali wanted to tell her that his life would have been fine if the meddlers from the future hadn’t chosen Khurosan as their fulcrum for moving history, but his English wasn’t up to the task.
    He said, “I’m here. From me, big tragedy for your nation? I’m honest man and hard worker. I not betray your hospitality.”
    Cheryl snickered. Ali wasn’t sure if she was sneering at his English or his sentiments, but he persisted. “Your leaders did agreement with other nations. Anyone asking protection gets fair hearing.” Shahin had impressed that point on Ali. It was the law, and in this society the law was everything. “That is my right.”
    Cheryl coughed on her cigarette. “Dream on, Ahmad.”
    “My name is Ali.”
    “Whatever.” She reached out and caught him by the wrist, then held up his hand to examine his ID bracelet. “Dream on, 3739.”
    #
    James called Ali to his office and handed him a letter. Reza translated it for him. After eight months of waiting, in six days’ time he would finally have his interview.
    Ali waited nervously for Ms. Evans to call him to help him prepare, as she’d promised she would when they’d last spoken, all those months before. On the morning of the appointed day, he was summoned again to James’s office, and taken with Reza to the room with the speakerphone, the “interview room”. A different lawyer, a man called Mr. Cole, explained to Ali that Ms. Evans had left her job and he had taken over Ali’s case. He told Ali that everything would be fine, and he’d be listening carefully to Ali’s interview and making sure that everything went well.
    When Cole had hung up, Reza snorted derisively. “You know how these clowns are chosen? They put in tenders, and it goes to the lowest bidder.” Ali didn’t entirely understand, but this doesn’t sound encouraging. Reza caught the expression on Ali’s face, and added, “Don’t worry, you’ll be fine. Fleeing from the Scholars is flavor of the month.”
    Three hours later, Ali was back in the interview room.
    The official who’d come from the city introduced himself as John Fernandez. Reza wasn’t with them; Fernandez had brought a