Sophia
We hit traffic just a few blocks from the hotel. Bumper to bumper. And just like New York, everyone loves to honk even when nothing can be done.
It’s not my idea of venting frustration. The incessant honking just makes everything worse. I’m starting to get a headache, and I never peed at Karim’s palace.
Big mistake. It’s gotten to the point where my bladder has turned molten. Burning.
“You know what? I can just walk from here.” I lean forward so I’m closer to the driver and point out the windshield. “I see the hotel,” I say, pointing at the white wall I recognize. “It’s a few blocks. It’s no big deal.”
He says something back in Arabic.
I point again and pantomime walking with my fingers. “I can walk.”
From the snail’s pace we’re moving at, I’ll be in the car for another half hour if I don’t. I hit the unlock button on the door. “I’m sorry.”
I don’t want to be rude, but I figure he’d prefer this to me peeing on the white leather seats.
He shouts out the window after me but doesn’t leave the car.
“Sorry!” I say again, baring my teeth to show my shame.
He waves me off and mutters a single word I figure is an insult. Probably calling me an idiot.
The pressure feels better when I walk, but the heat outside is oppressive.
Dry. Oven like. It’s over one hundred degrees. I get to the white-painted walls, only to find a wrought iron gate. I realize this isn’t my hotel.
Oh no.
My heart sinks and lands directly atop my bladder.
People on the street are giving me a skeptical eye. I look like I’m a long way from my dig site. I start walking back to the car, but it’s not where I got out. The car is nowhere to be seen.
He must’ve turned down one of these narrow streets that leads back the way we came.
Don’t panic. Don’t panic.
Think.
I pull out my phone and put the hotel into maps. It takes a while but eventually loads. It’s only 0.7 miles away.
My shoulders sink in relief. Okay. I’m not going to die, but I am an idiot. I’d get a cab if they weren’t all at a standstill. I start walking the way the car was headed.
Unfortunately, it’s not a straight 0.7 miles. There are two rights and a left. Easy enough. But after five minutes of walking, the map zooms out and says recalculating route .
What? My directional arrow isn’t pointing the right way now. It’s telling me to walk back the way I had just come. I try to memorize the streets in relation to where the hotel is on the map, but they’re in Arabic.
If it wasn’t for this dehydration headache, I feel like I’d have this figured out. I’m proud that I don’t panic.
I stay smart and don’t follow my maps app down what looks like a back alley with nothing but three young men silently gambling while crouched on milk crates.
New note to self: When lost in a place like this, only venture where there are other women. I stay on the busy roads, and while it takes me longer to get closer to the hotel, I eventually figure it out.
I see my hotel a few blocks ahead.
I’m almost there when the world suddenly goes sideways. There’s a sharp pain in my arm as I’m yanked off the street and into a cooler alley.
I see white skin, black tattoos. A hand covers my mouth, but I recognize this attacker immediately. It’s the Russian. My head spins. I shout, but the sound is muffled.
He tries to pull my arms together behind my back with one hand while his other still covers my mouth.
He doesn’t have a good grip. I move my mouth over the edge of his gloved hand so it’s between my teeth and bite down.
He yells, and at the same time I throw my elbow back as hard as I can. I can feel from the hard bone that I get him right in the ribs.
He “oofs” as the air leaves his lungs and his grip loosens. I turn around to try to get back on the busy street he snatched me from, but he’s blocking my path. I don’t try to dart past him. I don’t think.
I just lift my sandaled foot and bring it down as hard as I can on his ankle. This time he doesn’t grunt.
He screams and whips a knife out from his belt. He swings the blade towards me in an arch, and I can feel the air it displaces on my chest. He missed by an inch.
I turn and sprint down the alley he pulled me into. The concrete is wet, and the alley is strung with clotheslines stretching from the buildings on either side of the street.
“Help!” I yell.
I keep running and save my breath. I take a right and a left. Still, these alleys are empty of people. I see sand burning bright from the sun. An exit. A street. I sprint towards it, and when I exit the alley, I realize it’s not a street.
I’m in a construction site. A giant one. There’s no time to retrace my steps if I’m being chased.
I don’t know where to hide. There aren’t many choices.
I look left and right. There’s a narrow trench that was probably dug for pipes. I run fifty yards and jump in.
If the Russian chooses to investigate the site thinking I hid, he’ll find me. My only hope is he thinks I’m still running.
My eyes start to water as I hear footsteps crunch on the dirt a few minutes later. I can tell it’s him. They’re slow, searching. Eventually, I hear them stop close by.
I picture the knife blade. My blood loosening this dry dirt and turning it to mud. I want to scream so bad that I put my hands over my mouth. Then I hear a ringtone. It’s obnoxious, like those of old flip phones.
He answers and starts to speak in Russian. He’s furious and talks fast. I can hear the phone snap shut and then his footsteps recede.
I’m left in silence. Almost. There are the sounds of distant traffic. Kids shouting somewhere. I’m in the middle of a city of millions yet hunted and alone.
He might’ve left, but I think it’s just as likely that instead of searching this entire site and risking me sneaking off when he’s peeking under a bulldozer, he’s going to wait until I think he’s gone and pop my head up.
At least that’s what I would do if I were a Russian criminal.
It doesn’t help that the trench I’m wedged in offers no shelter from the sun. It’s shallow, the sides don’t provide shade, and the sun is at its highest point for the day.
Five minutes pass.
Ten.
There is no sound of the Russian. I don’t want to risk making the noise it would take to use my phone and I’m still not going to show myself, but I’m going to have to pee.
It’s quite the operation, but I’m able to get my pants down, position myself so I don’t end up drenching myself, and pee.
Oh. Oh Lord.
It’s like drinking a glass of water after being thirsty. Like popping a pimple times a million. This is where the term sweet release was first penned.
The burn and pressure subside, and I scoot back up so I don’t have to sit in my own filth. I lie still and breathe.
I let an hour pass doing nothing but counting my breaths and watching thin wisps of clouds pass overhead. They do little to lessen the sunlight.
An hour is all I can take. I’m being baked by the sun. I’ve protected my skin and face, but my insides feel boiled. I’m sweating, and my headache has moved to migraine territory.
I grip a rock in my fist and get to my feet. I have to grimace and hold my head as still as possible to keep it from throbbing. No one comes barreling towards me. Nothing moves in the site.
The Russian is gone.
I walk slowly to another alley and pick my turns carefully so I exit on a busy street. I don’t drop the rock until I’m walking with other women.
I don’t realize how hot I’d let myself get. My vision is blurry. It’s green and purple and yellow like a bruise. A horn sounds close to me, and I realize I’m in the street not on the sidewalk.
This is bad.
That’s about as much thought as I can give the situation. I’m stumbling forward, and suddenly, my arm is caught in someone’s grip again.
Oh no. I can think but not scream. The Russian. But there’s no ugly black tats on the hand that holds on to me.
I turn around to see a blue suit.
James.
His eyes are narrowed and worried. I watch his lips move. He’s asking a question, but I can’t answer. I’m too relieved to see him. And then my bruised vision obscures him and the swirling black and purple return.
Except this time, it’s all I can see, and everything goes black, entirely.