You can read Part One Here.
"But... where are they taking them?"
I asked stupidly, already knowing the answer. Our co-worker stepped up and plainly explained to me that they are going to a detention center. And if they aren't imprisoned... they will be sent back.
And that was an even sadder realization that some of these people... would prefer to be imprisoned than return to the poverty that they were trying to escape. At least in prison, there were guaranteed meals.
The ride back to the hospital with the four patients was a silent and somber one.
As it rocked on the uneven roads, the food in the cab shifted and let out the overwhelming smell of long cold meals.
One of the men woke up and quietly whimpered:
"...Manje?"
"... Food?"
I fought back tears and quietly tucked the meals under the seat. I knew we couldn't give them anything. My entire soul screamed, wanting to feed them. I took solace in the fact that they would be fed soon at the hospital.
When we unloaded them at the hospital and moved them into the bright lights, that was when I noticed that they were just... caked with salt from sweat and the ocean. Some with blood. Scratches, scrapes, lips cracked open from being in the sun and having no water to drink. Their faces were sunken in and they were so, so tired.
They were very quiet, they went in without a fight. I couldn't tell you if they wanted to fight but were just too exhausted or if they had resigned themselves to what was happening.
I got that answer later.
After getting them all in with a doctor, we basically stuck around for a while in case they needed any extra help. Afterall, the hospital was extremely small and it was late.
I was making rounds and found myself in the hallway. One of the men had been moved into a stretcher in the hall. He was handcuffed to the bed, like the other three. He was on his second bag of saline and seemed to be sleeping comfortably. I reached in to check that his pulse wasn't thready and his eyes shot open.
He looked up at me.
I've seen horror and fear depicted so many times in movies and television shows. But there is no actor that can recreate the kind of wild light that comes over the eyes of a desperate man.
He said something to me, he was stammering, but I didn't know enough to catch what he was saying. I simply tried to soothe him, tell him that he's safe. There's medicine.
I saw his eyes dart to his feet.
About 10 feet away was an alarmed exit door.
Before I could tell him no or further restrain him, he used one arm to push me back with all of his strength. He vaulted over the railing of the bed, the handcuffs pulling tight as he hit the floor. And then he stumbled.
His whole body became like a possessed ragdoll. He moved but was unable to do it with any true strength. It was like watching a man in invisible quicksand struggle to surface for air as he dragged himself, and the stretcher, towards the door.
That was when I noticed that the bag that was in his arm and swung near my face was clearly marked as a painkiller.
He was crying out in Haitian Creole.
I was so shocked and so heartbroken by the scene that I froze for a moment. I was literally watching someone trying to escape.
And part of me wanted to let him.
The other co-worker came around the corner and restrained him. An officer came down the hall and helped put him back in the bed, wheel him to where he started and cuffed the other hand.
The drip was increased and I watched, almost sad that he didn't make his grand escape, as he drifted back off to sleep.
The co-worker informed me that he heard him shouting something along the lines of:
"I can't go back! I have nothing!"
And what he said as he crawled towards the door:
"Free... free..."
After that, I excused myself to "eat my meal".
I pulled the food out of the truck and found a dark place at the side of the hospital.
I remember sliding my back down the wall and coming to rest on the sidewalk. This ridiculous box of food in my hands. It was filled with a burger that had pretty much every topping they had, and pineapple. The fries were piled so high in the box that it barely stayed closed. It popped open when I tossed it to the ground in disgust.
The sickly smell of the food filling the air around me.
I lit a cigarette and I wept.
I wept for what they tried for and lost. I wept for what they had to return to. I wept for those that may have been on the boat at the start and never made it. I wept for the old man and his bible. I wept for the man in the stretcher. I wept for all the times they were hungry and cold. I wept for their families. I wept that they had nothing, and since they had nothing, they had nothing to offer to enter legally. I wept because these people weren't taking the easy option, they were taking the only one they had.
I wept because I knew that I was powerless to stop it. Powerless to help.
