Free Hiding in Plain Sight by Nuruddin Farah Page A

Nairobi?—she finally finds the strength and the voice to pick up and say hello.
    The hotel receptionist informs her that she is sending up a fax message that has arrived marked VERY URGENT . And because the womangives neither the sender’s name nor the country of origin, Bella again allows her mind to go wild, imagining all sorts of far-fetched scenarios. Perhaps the fax brings news that her niece and nephew have been in a car accident on their way from their boarding school on the outskirts of Nairobi. Bella sits down, her lips silently unleashing a salvo of Koranic verses she hasn’t recited since childhood. The next minute her optimism is ascendant, the fax bringing a different kind of news about Aar: that his body was found in perfect condition, proof that he did not suffer much pain or trauma. She stands by the entrance to her room, ready to open the door to the bearer of the message. When she hears the lift doors open and then footsteps approach, she gives in to her eagerness and opens the door. But there is no one in the corridor. So she sits tight and waits, accepting her powerlessness to do anything about anything.
    Bella tells herself that she has lived for years in a cocoon. With no child of her own and no steady partner, she hasn’t had many worries to bother her. Healthy, young, and blessed with good looks, content with the professional niche she has made for herself, she has had few serious worries, at least until Aar’s transfer two years ago to the UN office in Mogadiscio. From that day on, she paid more attention to the news coming out of Somalia. Even so, she was unmoved by much of what she read, even the suicide bombings and the constant deaths from IEDs planted by the terrorists. As long as the casualties were unknown to her personally, the tragedies felt abstract. Until now! As she said to Marcella—was it yesterday or the day before?—“Aar’s death changes everything.” What she meant was this: From now on, when the telephone rings in the middle of the night, she will imagine a car accident, a bombing in a shopping mall or restaurant in which someone dear to her loses their life. And while she will no longer worry herself to deathabout Aar, she will dread what might happen to her nephew and niece, the same way many a parent she knows has an ear cocked for a phone call when her teenagers are out at a party after midnight.
    Bella is just at the point of wondering if she might have misunderstood the receptionist when she hears a gentle knock on the door. Now she takes her time before answering, searching for a little baksheesh, but she has found only euros when there is a second tapping and then a third. She opens the door and finds herself face-to-face with a handsome young man with big eyes and a fetching smile, in hotel uniform. Extending her right hand to receive the envelope he bears, she sees that it is shaking and stops. But the young man has no eyes for her trembling hand; he is ogling the slight opening where her robe has slipped a little. Suddenly amused, Bella relaxes and, no longer shaking, receives the envelope with both hands and thanks him.
    â€œWhy has it taken you so long to come up?” she asks him. “I’d almost given up.”
    â€œThe receptionist twice sent me to the wrong room,” he replies, shaking his head and smiling. “Maybe she was confused because your name is hyphenated on the fax, but you registered with only a single name.” But he apologizes and she gives him a couple of euros for his troubles before she gently closes the door.
    Her hand is trembling again as she takes a seat, her feet planted on the floor. Bizarrely, she looks left and then right, as if she expects someone else to be with her in the room or as if she were engaged in a conversation. Then she nods her head, as though giving an okay, and tears the envelope open and reads the name of the sender: Helene, in Kampala. But Bella knows no Helene in