Mid-November 2015, Bratislava

It was a cold and grim autumn evening, rainwater puddles flooding the deserted streets of Bratislava, a slow but persistent drizzle soaking those few still out on the streets. A solitary pedestrian wrapped in layers of scarves glanced upwards, towards the bright windows of the building next to him before pulling his chin deeper into the collar, and stuffing hands further into pockets, accelerating his gait to return home sooner. Behind these windows, lit up to expel dark, there was warmth, families sending their children to bed, parents reading fairy-tales from colourful books, young couples on their sofas watching television together, and some grandparents sipping tea at their dining table. Just under the roof of that building, there were three tall mansard windows, raindrops pattering against the glass with a monotonously continuous ‘pak pak’ sound. Behind these three windows lived a young woman named Eva who at this point, dressed in cotton pyjamas with a snowflake print and double-layered wool socks, had huddled on her sofa under the duvet. On top of the duvet cocoon sat her laptop, and she was clicking away a translation for the next bestseller. The young woman was fully immersed into the story when uninvited vibrations from somewhere in the periphery of the cocoon brought her back to reality. Hesitantly Eva dug out her mobile phone from under the layers of blankets to learn that the unexpected call was from her childhood friend, Martina. By the time Eva finally had got a hold of her phone, it had already stopped ringing, so she dialled Martina’s number.  

‘Can you please come with me?’ Martina pleaded from the phone speaker after introducing Eva to her ingenious plan of entering a fake marriage. Eva’s right hand, the one holding the phone, was shaking, her throat had become dry. Déjà vu, the history repeating itself. Five years ago, Martina had called Eva to tell her she was getting married to someone she had met three months earlier, a guy with a dubious past and a petty criminal record. Eva remembered standing with a phone in her hand and uncomfortable anxiety swelling in her chest. She hadn’t tried hard enough to stop her friend back then. If she had, maybe things would have turned out differently for Martina? 

‘You cannot be serious about this,’ Eva muttered. ‘Are you really planning to go and marry a complete stranger? Have you not heard anything about human trafficking, or modern-day slavery? Do you want to get into that kind of problem? Don’t you have enough to deal with?’

‘Yes, Eva. That’s exactly what I’m trying to do, to deal with my problems.’ 

Eva sighed again.

‘Martina, I can lend you some money. I obviously don’t have enough but…’

‘No, you can’t’ Martina’s voice rose sharply, a pinch of panic, ‘You already did, and I can’t pay it back. Neither to you, nor my parents, nor the bank. I need to do this, don’t you understand?’

‘No, I don’t. You are running from a wolf into a lion’s den.’ There was a moment of silence on the phone. 

‘Sorry that I called you, Eva. Forget what I said.’ Then Martina hung up. 

Eva squeezed the phone in her hand, and let her arm slowly slide downwards, next to her side. For a moment she sat there, motionless, just her eyes rolling around aimlessly, as if seeking for a salvation. Martina will go and do it. She will go alone to some strange traffickers’ hideout and let them convince her to marry a stranger for money. Eva slumped further back against her sofa, the phone slid out of her hand, her head against the backrest, eyes staring aimlessly into the ceiling. The rain was still relentlessly pattering the roof. 

‘They certainly would not allow Martina do this,’ Eva mumbled to herself while sitting at the kitchen table the next morning, a chunky knitted throw covering her legs, one hand holding a cup of black coffee, the other - a finncrisp slice with avocado and soft cheese, both yet untasted. ‘But would she listen at all? Gosh, she wouldn’t, when has she listened to anyone?’ Eva continued the intense conversation with herself. ‘Oh no, I cannot do that. If her parents hear their only daughter is resorting to selling herself? They will die from grief. What should I do?’

Eva placed the lukewarm coffee and her breakfast slice back on the table, rested her forehead in her palms, elbows balancing on the table, and sat like that for some moments. Then she got up and fetched her phone from the bedside table. ‘I will go with you,’ she said after dialling Martina’s number. 

Few anxious days later, Eva found herself in a shabby run-down flat together with Martina and a chubby bald mid-aged man with hideous moustache who introduced himself as mister Singh. Eva observed the man with suspicion as he flashed a broad unattractive grin demonstrating a row of uneven blackened teeth (some of which were missing). This smile, which perhaps was meant to make the two women feel comfortable and assured, only added to his somewhat creepy impression. He pointed towards an old shabby sofa, and they carefully sat down attempting to utilise as little of the filthy-looking seater space as possible. Sticky sweat layered over Eva’s palms as she clasped them together on her lap. Her whole body appeared to have become rigid as if made from wood, unwilling to adapt to the place she had arrived to. Eva glanced at her friend; there was a crease in Martina’s forehead, yet she stared ahead of herself confidently.

 ‘You don’t need to worry, darlings, we will take care of everything. Everything,’ mister Singh looked from Martina to Eva and back again as he stressed his words for maximum impact. He was leaning forward with his chest, and his little round eyes were about to pop out from their sockets. ‘The marriage is just for paper, you just need to pretend a little, and tada! - you have earned a lot of money,’ mister Singh waved both his hands around expressively as he spoke. Inadvertently, Eva noted to herself that he somewhat resembled a merchant, trying to sell them his fancy saucepans. She could hardly believe that there were women delusional enough to sign up for such affairs, yet here she was, witnessing an act of self-destruction.  

‘Ask them about everything,’ Martina had instructed Eva on the way to the meeting. Although Martina understood basic English well enough, she didn’t converse freely. They had sat in a bus when this conversation unfolded; it had been midday, and the bus had been almost empty. Eva had only nodded, her stomach churning and her throat drying out just imagining that in a short while she would be facing criminals, talking with them, arranging her friend’s plans with them. 

 ‘There is a high demand for European women,’ the bald man explained, and Eva realised she had lost the track of the conversation for a moment, ‘it will not take long to find a customer. It could be a few days or a few weeks at most,’ he then paused. ‘But you should know that the Home Office are tightening their grip nowadays,’ the broker folded his puffy hands into little fists and squeezed them tightly in a manifestation of anger. To him, the Home Office were not about law enforcement, they were a hindrance, a threat to his business. After a deep sigh, he continued, ‘so you will not be able to get married immediately, it will take some time, making arrangements and booking the registration. We will need to provide evidence of your relationship, like taking photos together. But don’t worry, girls, we are the best in the field, we know how to solve these problems.’

Eva chuckled. Best in the field, huh?

‘And where would we be staying during this period?’

‘We have a dedicated accommodation for the brides, don’t you worry. It is very, very nice,’ mister Singh advertised while stroking his thick moustache with his plump darkened thumb. He must have elaborated his techniques for luring young naïve women into high expectations through countless previous conversations. Eva glanced sideways at Martina who kept smiling and nodding at everything the broker said and sighed helplessly. Her friend will not turn back, she could see it easily.

‘So, how does this happen? How do we meet our prospective clients? And when would we need to go to England?’ Eva resumed her enquiries. 

‘You will stay here for now. When we have a potential customer, we will arrange a video call and you can discuss everything. If you both agree, we will buy you the tickets, you don’t need to worry about anything,’ Mister Singh was full of convincing carelessness, and for the briefest of moments a vision of herself in a wedding dress, marrying a stranger in a foreign country swept through Eva’s brain.

Before escorting them out, mister Singh stretched out a notebook and a pen, saying ‘please write your name and phone number here. So that we can contact you with an offer.’ Martina took it, smiled, and wrote down her number. Mister Singh then stretched the same notebook to Eva who hesitated for a moment, then scribbled her own number into the notebook. 

The meeting had taken place in suburban Bratislava, and the young women had to travel in a bus to return to the town centre. Martina kept talking throughout their whole return journey – how this opportunity will turn her life around, how she had no other choice, how this will be done and finished in a month’s time. Eva didn’t listen, she stared out through the splattered window glass of their transportation, at the streets which were grey and mundane. ‘Just like my life,’ she thought. 

Later in the evening, Eva opened her laptop, sat at it for several hours and did not translate a single sentence. Instead, she just blankly stared into the screen, words blurred in front of her, making no sense, bearing no meaning. Finally, she got up, showered, and climbed into her bed, yet she could not fall asleep. She lay on her back and observed the pattern of light reflections drawn by the stray rays of the streetlights, which had snuck through her window and were playing on her ceiling. Her fingers were drumming an old song against her collarbone. Life was weird, so weird. 

Late November 2015, Bratislava

Eva was sitting in an urban cafe, her laptop on the little table next to a cup of coffee and a small plate with a half-eaten croissant. About a week had passed since meeting mister Singh, and Martina’s crazy plan felt almost like a blip in the reality of her normal life. As Eva’s hand was raising the white ceramic coffee cup to take a sip, her phone vibrated, causing her to jump in her seat, almost spilling the beverage onto herself. She placed the coffee cup back on the table and picked up the phone. It was a message from mister Singh asking to arrange a skype call. For a while Eva stared into the phone, then casted her eyes around the cafe, and wrote ‘I’m available now.’ The cafe was almost empty, it was an afternoon of a working day. Soon enough her phone began vibrating, Eva plugged in her headphones and accepted the video call.

A man called Hamza was together with the broker at the other end of the line, they were both sitting in a car. Eva couldn’t tell much about his appearance due to the poor quality of the connection. And whatever features of his face were not obscured by the graininess of the video were concealed by his thick black beard. 

 ‘What is your name? How old are you?’ his clear and loud voice with a slight accent demanded into Eva’s ears. The way he spoke out every word, slowly, distinctly, made her wonder whether he expected poor command of English from her side. 

‘My name is Eva. I’m 29 years old,’ by inertia she took a breath to continue with her education and job history but realized just on time that it was probably irrelevant. Therefore, instead, she utilized her best tactic of dealing with men - give them a chance to talk about themselves. ‘And what about you? How old are you? What do you do for living?’

‘Good. At least you seem to be able to speak,’ Hamza concluded in a frosty tone, ‘the previous one could not put two words together. I don’t see how it matters what I do, but if you must know, I am soon going to graduate with a master's degree in IT, and I have a part time job in IT. When can you come?’.

The previous one, like an object for purchase. Well, I guess that is what we are; Eva heard a sarcastic voice in her own head saying.

‘I asked when you can come,’ Hamza repeated in a low voice, cold like a waterfall, soaking Eva to the bone. Heavy ache began pounding at the back of her head. To her, who was only used to interacting with mildly mannered Slovak men, this sharp, dominant demeanour of Hamza was unfamiliar and incomprehensible. She remained silent and saw mister Singh appearing on the screen of her phone. 

‘She will come next week,’ mister Singh responded on Eva’s behalf. ‘You will have to send me a photo of your passport, so I can book a plane ticket,’ he then said to Eva. 

‘No,’ Eva snapped out of the daze.

‘What does she mean by no,’ Hamza’s voice resounded angrily into her ears. Eva stared at the bearded figure which had reappeared in the screen of her phone. ‘I will book the ticket myself,’ she mumbled in a quiet, tamed voice. 

After hanging up, the young woman sat still for a long time staring blankly at the black screen of her phone. Then she got up, grabbed her phone and laptop, stuffed both into her tote bag and left the place with rushed long steps. 

That evening Eva stood in her bathroom; palms outstretched under the stream of warm water. The running fluid reminded her of childhood, coming back home after long hours outdoors in the cold winter, her mum nudging her to warm her freezing hands. The feeling of the hot liquid running through her fingers was pleasant and calming, yet she could hardly feel any comfort, she was squeezed between walls, trapped by her own stupidity. What had she done? What was she going to do? 

Next morning Eva was woken up by a beep from her phone. She had slept late, tossing and turning in her bed for most of the night. Her eyes narrow, full of sticky sleep, she squinted when unlocking the screen of her phone. A blurry text message from Martina read ‘I had a call with my future husband yesterday! I’m going next week, mister Sink will buy me a ticket!’. Eva switched off the screen and buried her face into the pillow. Oh, Martina. She probably had sent her passport details already.

‘If you didn’t send them your passport details yet, please don’t! Buy the ticket yourself! Don’t give them your details!’ she texted after brushing sleep out of her eyelids. 

‘Sorry i did already,’ Martina replied, this careless girl. 

30th November 2015, Bratislava

‘I would never believe this!’ Martina chattered, stretching out on the mattress in Eva’s apartment. Their suitcases were packed, ready to leave in the early morning. Martina had come from their hometown to stay at Eva’s place for the night so they could travel to the airport together early next morning.  

‘Miss Always Right is up for breaking the rules! Don’t tell me you are doing this for me?’ Martina pulled her plump lips into a smooch. To Eva, her friend’s cheerfulness was daunting, but she thought Martina must be relieved not to be going alone. ‘I don’t know,’ Eva muttered absentmindedly as she reviewed her list of emergency equipment, carefully concealed in hidden pockets of her bags, or neatly sewed into some of her garments. Two reserve phones with English sim cards for herself and Martina procured from a dodgy internet site, miniscule GPS trackers looking just like keychains, the details of her rented PO box in London, soon housing copies of documents and iPad which she had shipped to it a few days earlier. Finally, she switched off the lights and laid back in her bed, knowing that she won’t sleep, mind crawling with worries of various sorts. She laid in her bed, heart thumping in the fear of anticipation, and provided generic remarks to Martina who was chatting about something, Eva had no idea what, because she did not listen, just filled the silence gaps with ‘mhm’, ‘yeah, I guess so’, or ‘oh really?’ purely based on the intonation of Martina’s voice. 

Few hours later, their eyes tired after a sleepless night, Eva and Martina dragged their suitcases down the stairs, into the dark and windy November morning. Eva hid under her huge pashmina scarf while walking to the bus, her heart trembling, Martina followed in small steps, constantly checking if she had taken this and that, and babbling nonstop. Eva had stopped paying any attention to her friend’s continuous verbal outburst.

The airport was still quiet and empty when they arrived, only 4:30 am. Their flight with a cheap charter was scheduled to depart shortly after 6 am. They had coffee in the only shop which was open at this hour. Sitting on a plastic chair with the paper cup in her stiff fingers in the cold airport in the dark morning hour, Eva thought of just getting up and running back home. The man, Hamza, of whom she was so scared, would unlikely come to Slovakia to take revenge on her for sabotaging their plan. Would he even be able to find her? Would the traffickers try to track her down? 

‘Come on, the gate has been announced, we should go,’ said Marina, getting up from her chair and wrapping her scarf around her neck. 

‘Aren’t you afraid at all?’ Eva asked, still seated, looking up at her friend, fingers still gripping the cup tightly. 

‘We should go now,’ Martina repeated, her voice was steady yet fragile, and Eva knew – Martina was petrified, just as herself. She got up and followed her friend to the airport gate, leading them towards their new life, bleak and thorny, as far as Eva could foresee.

1st December 2015, London Stansted

After a two-hour flight, the two young women exited the plane. There was no shielded tunnel for them, and they had to take wobbly steps to reach the wet ground. The frigid air and drizzle didn’t make the walk to the terminal pleasant. Despite the early hour, Stansted airport was crowded, people were everywhere. Many of them had stretched their bodies right on the ground, some were sleeping on their suitcases and some lucky ones had hijacked the few available seats. There was buzz around the newsagents and a couple of the open kiosks and shop booths. A mid-aged woman, wrapped in layers of various fabrics collected them from the crowded arrivals, packed them into a car and brought them to a scruffy two storey building in the eastern outskirts of London. The house was depressingly grey, sandwiched between two other almost identical buildings of similar shabbiness. A small squalid garden in front of the dwelling served as a depository for all sorts of junk – old broken children's crib, bike, lumber, some random bricks scattered all over the ground, and some filthy buckets filled with illogically assorted items. The house itself was just as tight and chock-full as its appearance from outside. Narrow carpeted staircase, decorated with countless stains; narrow galley kitchen visible from the corridor with the counterspace densely covered with scratched dishes and some foodstuff. 

Mister Singh, the broker they had met back in Slovakia, shambled from an adjacent room to greet them. 

‘Now, girls, welcome, welcome! You will be comfy here. Your passports, please,’ he ordered. Martina obediently passed her passport over. 

‘Give it back to her! You have no right to take our passports!’ Eva protested, fear gripping her throat, squeezing her voice thin and weak.

‘This is not a holiday trip, my dear,’ Mr Singh grunted and pulled Eva’s handbag out of her hands, his aggressive behaviour accelerating Eva’s heart rate. Her hands were shaking and palms had become hot and sticky with sweat, yet she stepped forward to retrieve her possession. Martina grabbed her friend’s hand tightly and pulled her back. ‘Let’s do what they say for now. It will be OK, you are prepared,’ she whispered to Eva in Slovakian. Eva stepped back and stood next to Martina. Yes, she had to remain calm and able to think. The heat slowly dissipated from her brain giving place to stiffening pain.

After the passport ordeal, Eva and Martina were brought to a room where they were to live until further notice – the ‘very, very nice accommodation’ according to mister Singh. The space was cold and damp and smelled like mould. They had to share a single room housing only four bunk beds with two other girls. The girls looked weary, and Eva wondered how long they had been there and what they had experienced. The silence in the room was heavy, both inhabitants of the room observing Martina and Eva cautiously. Finally, Martina took a few steps deeper into the room and sat on one of the free beds, pushing her suitcase under it. Eva claimed the last remaining bed – the top bunk. The sheets were worn and exuded the kind of smell Eva had only encountered in the basement of her parents' house, of all things old and worn. They sat in silence for a long while, Eva couldn’t know how long exactly – her phone was in the handbag, confiscated by mister Singh. 

Finally, one of the two girls broke the silence. ‘I am Edita,’ she said with a characteristic Baltic accent, ‘and this is Daria’. Upon hearing her name, Daria smiled vaguely and nodded her head. Daria’s hair was dark and short, she looked older than the other three girls, but it may have been just the result of an unsparing life. Eva figured that Daria wasn’t too good with English. Edita appeared to be comfortable with the language though, and Eva was burning with curiosity. 

‘How long have you been here?’ she asked.

‘Here – you mean this house? Or England?’ Edita smiled bitterly. Despite the lack of maintenance, she was good looking – apart from the dark circles under her eyes and the greyish tone of her skin, her complexion was pleasant. Her blonde hair was pulled together in a ponytail, and Eva could easily imagine that in the past it must have been thick and silky. 

Edita’s question caught Eva by surprise, and she lingered with her mouth half open, unsure what to say. Seeing Eva’s confusion, Edita explained: “I came to England three years ago with my boyfriend, we both started working here,’ she sighed ‘but then we broke up… well, he left, and suddenly I had no money and nowhere to stay, I couldn’t pay for a flat by myself. I stayed with a friend for a few months, but she couldn’t have me any longer. Someone she knew told her I could quickly earn money by paper marriage, and I agreed. I had nowhere to stay, this was no worse than other options,’ she averted her eyes, and Eva felt that with the last sentence Edita was trying to convince herself more than anyone else. 

‘She put me in contact with mister Singh and he took me here. It’s been about three weeks since I arrived’. 

‘So, have they matched you with anyone yet?’ 

‘Matched!’ Edita spurted a joyless laughter and said somewhat sarcastically ‘you make it sound so nice! Well, they thought they had a deal, I even spoke with the person twice, but he disappeared last week, I think he couldn’t pay everything they asked’.

‘And what about Daria?’ 

‘She has been here for more than a month, I’m not quite sure. You see, she doesn’t speak much English, and it’s a problem, if they cannot communicate, they are going to look suspicious. No one wants to have a bride who doesn’t speak English at all’. 

It turned out, Edita was working. Soon she left for her job in a restaurant kitchen. Eva noticed her hands were coarse with broken and darkened nails.   

Eva was woken up by a flimsy undefined object as it hit her face. She opened her eyes to find the ceiling falling onto her. Then she realised that the ceiling was static, she simply was right under it. Oh, the sham marriage plan, the flight, the slummy house of these racketeers. Eva wished she could go back to the nothingness of the sleep. 

‘Get up, enough sleep,’ said a female voice. Eva sat up and saw her handbag lying on the pillow – must have been the object that had hit her head moments ago. She immediately stuffed her hand inside – yes, her phone was there. A sigh of relief left her throat. Her phone was not taken from her, she thought, that was a good sign. Brushing the sleep out of her eyes, Eva wondered how she had been able to fall asleep. Perhaps the exhaustion of stress, and the sleepless night before had done their part. 

Umm Ramsha brought them downstairs to the narrow kitchen and commanded them to various tasks. As unexcited as Eva was for chopping large amounts of onions, she felt an immense relief having seen that Edita was able to leave for her job, and that they were merely made to help in the kitchen which didn’t imply an imminent threat to their lives. 

In the afternoon, mister Singh returned with news – he had arranged for Martina to meet her customer (as they now referred to their future sham husbands) the next day. They were to start working on relationship evidence. Eva sighed in silent relief - she didn’t need to meet her client yet. Just imagining that she would have to meet Hamza in person sent cold shivers through her body.

Martina had told Eva everything she knew about her ‘client’ – which was not much. He was around thirty and had overstayed his visa. Marina spoke of him with compassion from which Eva concluded that he ought not be a vicious villain like her own customer appeared to be. Only the ‘overstayed his visa’ part made Eva nervous, yet she didn’t try to argue with Martina.  

2nd December 2015, Eastern suburbs of London

The next day arrived grey and cold; the morning mist turned into a never-ending drizzle. Around lunchtime mister Singh took Martina outside where another man was waiting for them in a black sedan. Mister Singh pointed Martina to the back seat and sat next to her, leaving the front passenger seat free. They drove through busy yet listless city streets and after half an hour or so stopped in front of what appeared to be a small metro station. The man in the driver’s seat made a call, and soon a tall dark-skinned man entered the car and sat in the front passenger seat. Martina swallowed the knot in her throat trying to remain calm. She had only spoken to her client once, and she was petrified, nevertheless, she reminded herself to focus and listen to everything that was spoken, just as Eva had instructed her. 

Martina was not able to understand everything that was discussed but she made some sense of the conversation between the three men. It appeared that they had met before at least a few times to negotiate the deal. She saw with horror that her passport was given to this man in exchange for an envelope of money (mister Singh took great care to count the notes – twice). Martina’s groom was to set up some bills in her name to his address. Mister Singh then went on to boastfully explain that the client had nothing to worry about – he had contacts in the registration office, everything could be sorted if money was available. Even an expired visa wouldn’t be a problem. Once the three men were through with their business, they told Martina and her suitor to exchange phone numbers and start chatting. Finally, they drove to a small park where the ground was covered with dead leaves, and Martina and Ganiru (Martina had a hard time remembering his name) were ordered to take some cheerful selfies. Ganiru appeared a little shy, and his apparent awkwardness as they stood closely together for the photo assured and comforted her. 

Back to racketeers’ den, and Martina retold Eva all the details of her outing. Imagining that her passport will be given to Hamza sent cold chills down Eva’s spine. She couldn’t perceive how she would be able to smile for a selfie next to that man. 

The following couple of days passed uneventfully with the exception of mister Singh’s announcement that he had a few new potential clients, and calls were arranged for Edita and Daria. Martina spent a good deal of their evenings on her phone, supposedly generating evidence with her sham husband, while Eva attempted to teach Daria some basic English phrases. Daria was not a talented student, and it took great effort for Eva to remain patient.

It was an afternoon just like the previous few, when mister Singh without knocking stuck his head through the door to the girl’s room. ‘Hey, you,’ he nodded towards Eva. Since the passport incident she had become the least favourite of the four women, now being addressed only as ‘hey, you’.

‘Get dressed. We are meeting your client.’

Eva’s heart sank, she was not mentally prepared. If only they had told her in advance, she would strengthen herself for this encounter, she would convince herself to manage. Yet she knew it was pointless to complain – mister Singh would not have a drop of patience for her. She inhaled deeply trying to stop her head from spinning, then put on her coat and grabbed her handbag.  

Since Martina had relied all details of her trip to Eva, she knew what to expect. Events followed one another just as anticipated. Another man in a car (although this time the car was blue) collected Eva and mister Singh from their accommodation and drove them to a metro station. Hamza was already there, waiting outside, dressed in a brown leather jacket and black jeans, and looking just as dangerous as Eva had imagined him. He answered the phone call and took a quick look around, searching for the car with his eyes, his sight lingering just a moment longer on the blue hatchback. Then he strolled over and threw his body into the front seat. His beard was just as thick and black as Eva remembered from the call. He wasn’t tall, and to Eva’s quick assessment, perhaps even shorter than herself but of a strong build. Upon entering the car, he said nothing, just abruptly nodded, indicating to mister Singh and his partner in the driver’s seat that he was ready to talk business. 

‘We brought your girl,’ the driver nodded casually towards the backseat. Despite his well-studied indifference, Hamza turned around to peek at Eva. He casted a quick piercing stare from her head to toe and grunted in his throat. Eva sank deeper into the seat wishing to merge with it, to become invisible. However, Hamza didn’t look at her again. They drove to an empty parking lot, and the three men got drawn into discussing details of their plan. Mister Singh laid out his offer in the usual boastful tone. 

‘We first need to produce some evidence that you are a nice romantic couple,’ he smiled a disgusting smile and Eva felt nausea creeping up her throat. ‘You will exchange your phone numbers and talk to each other on the phone every day. We will take some photos together and that should do.’ Hamza nodded, and mister Singh went on to proudly explain about his contacts in the registration office. 

‘No thank you, I will sort out the registration myself,’ Hamza interrupted him. Mister Singh froze. Eva imagined that it was unusual for clients to object to his kind offers, and more so in such an abrupt manner. He changed his tone turning from a sleazy businessman into a formidable gangster ‘I really advise against that. We know the business; you will be protected if you do as we say.’

Hamza chuckled, unimpressed. ‘You are forgetting that the registration office depends on my address. Plus, what if someone tips off your contacts? I don’t need any loose ends.’

Mister Singh assured that address will not be a problem, but Hamza would not hear any of it. What a stubborn man, Eva concluded in her head. Following a heated negotiation of how much should be paid and when, Hamza finally pulled out an envelope and passed it over to the driver. Despite the course of the conversation, Eva had begun to relax a little since no one had addressed her in a while. Suddenly, Hamza and mister Singh got out of the car, and Eva realised she had not been focusing, and wasn’t sure what was happening. The two men exchanged their seats and Hamza sank into the backseat next to Eva. Only then Eva noticed that he had been carrying a black rucksack with him. He undid its zipper and extracted a red folder housing a good chunk of sheets which he then passed to Eva.

‘I have investigated the questions which can be asked in the interviews and compiled answers about myself. There is a form for you to fill, you can return it to me next time,’ he instructed. Eva automatically took the paper sheets and stared at him with a blank face.

‘Do you understand what I just said?’ Hamza demanded sharply. Eva swallowed hard, obviously he thought she was mentally disabled, how offensive. 

‘Yes, I understood. I will write down my answers to your questions and return the forms to you,’ she said to ascertain that she really had understood. ‘Good,’ Hamza nodded but his facial expression manifested anything but satisfaction. 

Then they drove to a park, and Eva couldn’t stop herself from wondering if all bogus couples took photos in the same park – wouldn’t registration officers notice repetition of the scenery? Perhaps it wasn’t a problem if they all worked for mister Singh.

For a change, the clouds that day were white and scarce giving way to occasional rays of sun. The park looked almost cheerful, if only Eva hadn’t been too preoccupied with her concerns to notice. They got out of the car and found a less populated spot in the park. 

‘This will do,’ Hamza said and threw his backpack on the ground. Eva stood quietly not knowing what to do and how to behave. Everything felt so unnatural, unreal even. ‘Don’t stand there like a fool,’ Hamza huffed at her, ‘come here, we need to take selfies.’ The word selfies sounded so ridiculous coming from his mouth, Eva nearly spurted an involuntary giggle. She stepped closer, still not knowing how to manage her own body which felt stiff, strained. Hamza threw his arm around her and pulled her by his side while stretching the other hand with his phone away to take the photo. Eva’s heart began racing violently, it was fear that was catching in her uneven breath and something else undefinable, the uncertainty shrouding her future. 

‘Smile, you look like a statue,’ Hamza ordered, his voice almost directly into her ear.

Eva tried to fold her mouth into a smile, it wasn't easy, her attempt of a smile probably also looked unnatural and stiff. Suddenly, without a slightest warning, Hamza turned his head towards her and lightly pressed his mouth against her cheekbone. Eva felt the heat of his breath against her skin, the sound of him breathing in, deeply, his coarse beard against her skin, a little scratchy, a little itchy, the bitter smell of his cologne filling her nostrils. The moment that could not have been more than a split second seemed to last for too long and to be too short. Eva’s head became filled with hot heavy liquid, her palms turned cold and sweaty. Maybe that’s how the end of time may feel, torn between the centrifugal force to escape, and the gravitational pull to remain. Should she push him away, were her trembling hands capable of pushing anything at all? Or was it better to stay like this, and let the Earth stop spinning? When he released his grip and removed his arm from around her shoulders, Eva lost her balance and stumbled backwards. 

‘Looks alright,’ Hamza inspected the selfies he had just taken, he didn’t take another look in her direction. Eva stood numb and speechless. 

Finally, they returned to the car. Loud ringing in Eva’s head prevented her from understanding anything that was spoken afterwards but she saw a passport being handed over – her passport, yet she was not able to say a word. 

Once back, Martina wanted to know all the details of Eva’s adventure. Eva, recovered by then, retold her every detail skipping only the events in the park which she summarised as ‘and then we took some selfies.’ For the rest of the evening Eva remained withdrawn, she could not focus on anything, she could not erase the sensation of Hamza’s hot breath lingering on her cheek, not even after she had spent several of the ten allocated minutes of her scarce showering time aggressively scrubbing it with water and soap. 

Eva had taken her shower and returned to her bunk bed where she sat cross-legged drying her shoulder-length hair and chatting with Martina when her phone rang. Unknown English number. 

‘H-hello,’ Eva responded faintly. 

‘It’s me. We should talk to have conversation records on the phone,’ Hamza’s low voice travelled through Eva’s body like electricity.

‘I didn’t give you my number…’ she said quietly, more to herself than to him. 

‘No, you didn’t. I had to call the old man and ask him,’ the old man must have been mister Singh. Eva giggled. 

‘I’m glad to hear that you find it amusing,’ he didn’t sound glad at all, as far as Eva could tell. ‘It would have saved me valuable minutes if you had just given me your number when we met today.’

Why is it my fault, Eva thought, you did not even ask, you were too busy negotiating my price. She huffed to herself and said nothing of this aloud. 

‘So, what should we talk about?’ she asked instead, her mind struggling to balance between mortification and curiosity. 

‘Nothing. I have no time to waste on useless chatter. Just leave the phone aside, and after some time I will hang up,’ he responded sharply. Tears stung Eva’s eyes. She couldn’t handle being spoken to in such a manner. She didn’t reply, and her hand was on its way to push the phone under the pillow – with the call still ongoing, as instructed.

‘Eva,’ she heard from the phone and unwillingly restored it to its initial position next to her ear. 

‘Yes?’

‘Did you study the sheets I have given you? And did you fill your form?’

‘I … I haven’t yet,’ Eva suddenly felt like a failure, a disappointment, a scolded school kid in front of a teacher demanding homework which was never completed. 

‘What a waste,’ Hamza commented but Eva couldn’t take more of it. She quickly threw the phone under her pillow. Then she sat in her bed dazed, she had no idea what had happened to her life. Only a few weeks ago she had been living a calm and easy life, doing the job she loved, and now everything was upside down, inside out, a mess. She stared at the opposite wall behind Edita’s upper bunk bed, old tapestry with brownish damask pattern peeling off from the wall. When will she be able to go back, to resume her life? To be normal again? 

After a long moment of self-pity, Eva pulled the folded sheets out from her handbag and unfolded them. It was a chunk of multiple sheets densely covered with tiny scribbles in a slightly messy handwriting which was sometimes hard to read. Eva cast her eyes over the sheets and concluded that Hamza was the eldest brother to six siblings – five sisters and a young brother. His parents and siblings were all in Pakistan. Eva fetched the phone from under the pillow and concluded that Hamza hadn’t hung up yet. She muted the phone and opened the maps to look up the town he had named as his family home. It was a place amidst mountains, and google search returned more photos of landscapes than the town itself, insufficient for Eva to imagine the environment in which he had grown up. 

Hamza had carefully listed all his life on these sheets – his family information, his education, job, his favourite dishes (Eva had no slightest idea what these were – she wasn’t even sure how to pronounce the names), his favourite TV shows and games. Eva stared at the scribbles and wondered how this inhuman being could appear so human on the paper. 

Finally, after carefully reading through all the sheets and attempting to memorise some of it, Eva folded the papers and tucked them under the pillow. It was well past midnight, but the call was still going. Eva put her head on the pillow next to the phone and listened. She assumed that Hamza would have muted the call, but he hadn’t – Eva could hear regular clicking sounds – he must be still working. Concluding that he had forgotten about the call, she hung up. Tiredness seeped into her body, and she slept.