The Bone Sparrow

The first thing Harvey does when new kids arrive is to learn their names so that he can talk with us for real, and instead of talking to us by our numbers. Most people have their Boat ID as their number. Maá is NAP-24 and Queeny is NAP-23. But I was born in here, so I have a different ID. DAR-1, that’s me. The 1 is because I was the first baby ever born here. But Harvey, he won’t use those numbers, not even when he’s supposed to.

I ask Harvey about the water running out, but he just shrugs and says, ‘Too late now, Subhi, it’s already half full. What’s up? You don’t want a swim?’

I don’t say that I like toilets that can flush more, or that tomorrow is my shower day and you can’t have a shower without water. I don’t say, because my skin is aching, waiting to jump in that cool. And hearing that water makes me thirst even worse than before, especially knowing I can’t sneak even a drop because the tank water makes you sick.

But Harvey thinks of everything, and seeing my look he points to his bag, full to the top with water bottles. Harvey’s great like that. I make sure not to drink too much so there’s enough to go around.

I guess Beaver’s meanness just picks its moments. Or maybe it just picks its people. Eli reckons Beaver saving him is why Harvey can’t ever say bad against Beaver, even though he wouldn’t stand for any other Jacket treating people the way Beaver does. Eli reckons that makes Harvey spineless and not worth spit, but I kind of get it. I think.

The way Queeny tells it is that they’ve been here too long, is all. She reckons they used to be just like me, except maybe not so annoying.

Harvey thinks they’re bored, is all. But I get bored and I don’t get mean the way these boys do. I won’t either, no matter how long I’m here.

Eli reckons they just aren’t worth spit.

Queeny says they only do it so that I shut up for a bit and stop pestering them for more stories. She reckons the only time I’m ever quiet is when I’m being told a story. But Queeny doesn’t get it. I need these stories. Everyone else in here has memories to hold on to. Everyone else has things to think on to stop them getting squashed down to nothing. But I don’t have memories of anywhere else, and all these days just squish into the same. I need their stories. I need them to make my memories.

Harvey says that drawing down the stories for the oldies is important. He says it’s like I’m making the oldies their very own blanket to wrap themselves up in and keep them warm and safe.

I look at Harvey. I think of Oto and Anka and Iliya and Ba and Maá and Queeny and Eli and all of us. All of them all that time ago, and all of us now. Just trying to find somewhere to be safe. Just walking our journey to peace. I can hear Queeny’s words in my head and now they make sense. I get it now.

‘We’re the dead rats, Harvey. Just like Queeny said. Left out to rot so no one else bothers to try. There’s no keeping safe for us.’

Harvey looks at me like he’s never seen me before. But he doesn’t say I’m wrong.

The whale raises his head so his eyes are level with mine, and in the whale’s eye I see exactly what I have to do. For Eli. So everyone everywhere can feel that ache, fierce and strong. So no one ever forgets.

Queeny is wrong. We do exist. Eli existed. And now he’s gone. And everyone needs to know, to feel that pain tearing at them, even if just for a bit. Just so they know that once there lived a Limbo kid named Eli, and he had something important to do.

I scream out my tears now, and the sea thrashes and the Night Creatures are screeching, whirling and heaving themselves in and out of the water. All the little fish roll on to their backs and pop up to the surface of the sea, their eyes cloudy, their gills still.