Lindsey Chalmers: Remains
Two illegal immigrants acquire a suitcase. What is inside it, and what will they do when they find out?
Written for the 30 Days of Fright writing challenge, Day 22.
It was hot and humid in the trailer, but Arman and Farzin were glad that the tarpaulin curtains let some air in. What a strange country! They escaped the horrors of Taliban rule in the hope of finding freedom in England. The road signs seemed encouraging; there was no translation underneath each name. They had been told to get to Birmingham, wherever that was. The driver of this truck was carrying wooden platforms of some sort, and they had found a way to wiggle in between them. It was fairly cramped, but they had endured worse. Now the truck had stopped. A glance outside showed them to be in a crescent of road capped with a curtain of bushes grown close together.
Arman, who had spent every minute of his time in Calais learning English from well-meaning volunteers, told Farzin that they were 96 miles from Birmingham. He could tell from the big green road sign that stood nearby. He had seen it before the truck had pulled in here.
“I suppose the driver is getting something to eat,” said Farzin, his unshaven face pinched with envy.
“He will return soon enough,” Arman replied.
As he was speaking, they heard the sound of tyres crunching on the loose gravel.
Farzin chanced a glance.
A woman like the ones he used to see on television emerged from a small car, looked warily around, then took out a large suitcase. She jogged hastily towards the truck, lifted the curtain, opened it wide enough to admit the case, then began to heave it in.
She saw them.
She would surely report them.
The authorities would send them back to certain death.
She jumped.
She was afraid? She had nothing to fear, this was her country. What was there to be afraid of? Women could move freely here.
She must have realised they meant no harm because she smiled and said, “For you. Take it.”
The men pulled the suitcase onto the truck.
The woman went back to the car and drove away.
“Why did she do this?” Farzin asked. “Well-meaning Westerners give us food sometimes, but never this. I wonder what is in it.”
“We can open it later,” said Arman, who had noticed the weight and the way the contents moved. There was something heavy and… not soft; yielding. What could it be?
The big green signs counted down the miles to Birmingham. Soon the truck was unmistakably in the city—or near enough.
“Look at these shops!” said Farzin, his voice high in wonder. “Some of the signs are in Dari.”
“Then we get out here,” said Arman. “An opportunity should present itself soon.”
The truck came to a halt, its engine running, somewhere dark.
“Now!” said Arman.
They pushed the suitcase out and jumped after it. Then they marched smartly out of what turned out to be a wide railway bridge and into a side street.
“Let's hope nobody was paying attention,” said Farzin.
Nobody came after them. This didn't mean they wouldn't. Both men had been warned that many English people hated foreigners and would send them back, no matter what awaited them.
The street was empty. Most of the buildings were boarded up. Some had little trees with cones of purple flowers growing out of cracks in the roofs. If they could shift one or more boards, they could hide here, then make a plan for what to do next. And they wanted to see what that woman had wanted them to have.
There was a gap between the houses. One last look around. There was nobody to see them drag the suitcase down the side of the one with the faded red writing on. The rotten wooden slats of the fence gave way easily enough.
Farzin went first, took the case, then helped Arman into the overgrown back garden. He found a rock to bash the wooden boards that had been nailed into the door frame.
Arman had never told him how he had learned to pick a lock with a hair grip.
Soon they stood in the gloom of the musty old house. The lights didn't work; they checked. Farzin bashed one of the wooden slats off the window to let some light in. The overgrown bushes that surrounded the house hid them well enough to risk it. A cry of consternation sent him running back in.
Arman stood, his mouth agape, his eyes wide, pointing down at the case. He was trembling.
“What is it?” Farzin asked, looking warily around. “That cry was loud enough to wake the dead.”
“She killed him!” Arman looked lost, as though he were trapped in a nightmare.
“Killed who?” asked Farzin, though he suspected that the answer was—
“Her husband!” Arman replied. “I thought it was raw meat. It is, but it's human. She cut him up and put him into bags. I just found his arm! O Allah, preserve us from the wickedness of such people!”
“Are you sure?” asked Farzin, his face crinkled with disbelief.
“Look!” Arnan shouted, lifting up a bloody, mottled grey hand with a watch on its wrist, below the palm.
There was no denying that.
“What will we do?” asked Arman. “If we are caught with this, we will surely be blamed for it. They will deport us for sure!”
Farzin staggered back towards the door. “We have to get out of here,” he said. “Now. And no one must know about this.”
“We have to make sure they never find out,” Arman replied. “Let's find a place to leave this man, then go.” He put the hand back into its bag, then tied it off and zipped up the suitcase while Farzin explored the house, looking for a place to leave it.
A moment later, he returned. “There's a door that leads to an underground room,” he said. “We can put the suitcase there.”
***
Despite regular checks with the police, Mary had heard nothing about her husband Lindsey. Gnawed by guilt, she adhered to his schedule with religious zeal, though she had to find a job to support her family. The old-fashioned clothes had been replaced with an up-to-date wardrobe, but she always changed into her “uniform” when she got home.
Even that stopped when the children started asking why.
The schedule remained, though. As Lindsey had always said, “The benefit of a disciplined life is order.”
She didn't have to stick to it all the time, though, did she?
***
It was raining the day the wreckers came. The houses were reduced to rubble in less than an hour. The diggers followed, removing the rubble for landfill.
Two of the labourers worked especially hard at sorting the rubbish from the cellar of the second house. They heaved a stinking old suitcase into the waste removal truck without complaint, watching briefly as the compactor crushed it.
The truck then tipped its trailer into a hole at the end of the street, which was filled with rubble, covered with layers of soil, and compacted.
Arman and Farzin looked at each other, the shame of their involvement in that woman's crime mirrored in each other's expressions.
“Oi!”
The foreman was calling them.
“Get back to work, you two.”
Arman muttered a prayer for the comfort and guidance of the murdered man in the afterlife.
Farzin nodded, and said “Ameen.” It was the least he could do. He was, after all, about to build a house on top of him. ‘I should be grateful I won't have to live in it,’ he thought. The idea of this haunted him more than the sight of the severed arm Arman had shown him. And if he lived to be a hundred, there was no way he would ever forget it.
Illegal immigrants are often victims of trafficking and can fall prey to modern slavery. If you live in the UK and want to report suspected modern slavery, check out this Crimestoppers website article.
This story is part of a series:
Lindsey Chalmers, Redux | Lindsey Chalmers, Reborn | Lindsey Chalmers: Home At Last