Storytelling, Escapism, and Hope Theme Analysis

Her mum had written down each and every word in that book, and one day Jimmie would read them and hear her mum’s voice again. So she didn’t pack the book into the boxes with the other things.

That was three years ago. She still can’t read the words. Still can’t hear her mum’s voice.

But until then I keep on at Maá every night, asking her for a story. Just a single one. Because sometimes, in here, when people stop talking, and stop asking, and stop remembering, that’s when they start to lose that piece of themselves. That’s when their brains start to mush. It happens a lot.

Even though Maá doesn’t hear my asking any more, I keep trying, without even thinking on an answer. I keep asking every night, because if I don’t...

I told those boys to jam it. I told those boys that they could beat me with sticks as much as they wanted and I still wouldn’t kill a thing. I told those boys that they weren’t worth spit and then I went and broke all their traps so they’ll never build them again.

Except I didn’t. Except I couldn’t. I don’t tell Eli. And after, when I wiped that blood and fur off my hands and on to the dirt, the rats, all hidden in the shadows, watched me and shook their heads and turned away.

I know about Thermoses because some days the Jackets bring them in filled with wonderful smells that I never knew existed, and they sip away at those smells and yo-yo their keys, and all I can do is watch. Queeny gets right mad when they do that, but that just makes them laugh. They don’t laugh with their eyes, though, and soon enough they move away or put the lids back on the Thermoses. I don’t mind it. With smells, if you close your eyes and breathe as deep as you can, they turn into a taste right at the back of your throat, and then you can almost pretend that the Thermos was brought in for you as well.

‘Subhi. I don’t want it to end. I want this to last.’

I hand back that book without another word. I get it. I don’t want my ba’s stories to ever end either. ‘Good thing you don’t know them then,’ the duck says quietly. ‘They can’t end if they never start.’ He thinks he’s being funny.

She wonders what it would be like, only knowing what’s inside that fence. Never being able to go exploring. Never swimming in the creek or running down a hill. ‘He’s probably never even climbed a tree,’ she says out loud. Jimmie feels the howl in her throat turn from happy to sad at the unfairness of it all.

How can people be so mean to each other when isn’t everyone just the same anyway, and why can’t anyone work that out?

Then Queeny pulls out a camera. A real camera. The only cameras I’ve ever seen were when the newspaper guys came and took a big photo of all of us in here, waiting. I was right at the front and smiling, which Queeny said was stupid because we weren’t meant to be happy. I told her I was happy, though, and then she said something so quiet and low that I couldn’t make out the words. I didn’t ask her to repeat it.

Jimmie wants to ask more. Wants to find out how they can help, so that no one has to sew their lips together. Wants to know why they have been locked up in there for so long. Why no one is listening. Why it is illegal for people to try to save their families. Why it is illegal to want to live. Jimmie wants to know.

But her dad has already slid the paper across the table and is flicking through to the sports pages.

Queeny says they only do it so that I shut up for a bit and stop pestering them for more stories. She reckons the only time I’m ever quiet is when I’m being told a story. But Queeny doesn’t get it. I need these stories. Everyone else in here has memories to hold on to. Everyone else has things to think on to stop them getting squashed down to nothing. But I don’t have memories of anywhere else, and all these days just squish into the same. I need their stories. I need them to make my memories.

Harvey says that drawing down the stories for the oldies is important. He says it’s like I’m making the oldies their very own blanket to wrap themselves up in and keep them warm and safe.

‘A knife?’ the duck says. He doesn’t believe me, I can tell. ‘How would anyone get a knife in here?’

‘Through the packages I guess. The stuff of kings.’

The duck looks at me again and says, ‘Why would a king want a knife?’

‘To cut stuff, né?’

‘Pah,’ the duck says.

‘What would you know? You’re just a stupid duck.’

So much for a problem shared. The duck is just making it worse.

That Shakespeare duck looks at me then, and raises one eyebrow the way Maá used to when Queeny and I riled her up with our arguing. ‘What would you know? You’re just a stupid boy. In some countries in the world, ducks are kings, you know.’

Then we both smile and I tell the duck he’s quackers and we smile even more.

All the little rats who are too scared to go into the Space watch me, their noses quivering to see what happens next. I tell them that when I get back, I’ll tickle their stomachs for them, each and every one, and give them chocolate every chance I get. I tell them I’m sorry for their baby.

I don’t run. I walk. Just like Jimmie did. Straight ahead to the perimeter fence. [...]

Then I’m under and those rats and cheering and clapping their paws together and some are even whistling their congratulations.

I look at Harvey. I think of Oto and Anka and Iliya and Ba and Maá and Queeny and Eli and all of us. All of them all that time ago, and all of us now. Just trying to find somewhere to be safe. Just walking our journey to peace. I can hear Queeny’s words in my head and now they make sense. I get it now.

‘We’re the dead rats, Harvey. Just like Queeny said. Left out to rot so no one else bothers to try. There’s no keeping safe for us.’

Harvey looks at me like he’s never seen me before. But he doesn’t say I’m wrong.

The whale raises his head so his eyes are level with mine, and in the whale’s eye I see exactly what I have to do. For Eli. So everyone everywhere can feel that ache, fierce and strong. So no one ever forgets.

Queeny is wrong. We do exist. Eli existed. And now he’s gone. And everyone needs to know, to feel that pain tearing at them, even if just for a bit. Just so they know that once there lived a Limbo kid named Eli, and he had something important to do.

I scream out my tears now, and the sea thrashes and the Night Creatures are screeching, whirling and heaving themselves in and out of the water. All the little fish roll on to their backs and pop up to the surface of the sea, their eyes cloudy, their gills still.

‘It’s Ba’s,’ she says. ‘It’s his poems. It’s the last treasure.’ She touches the cover of the book with the very tips of her fingers. The way she says it makes me understand.

My treasures didn’t come from the Night Sea at all. Or from my ba. My treasures came from Queeny. Somehow that makes them even more special.

‘The sparrow in the house. Queeny was right after all. It did mean death. Eli...’ But Jimmie hears me. She hears and her eyes go soft and she shakes her head and brings my hand up to her cheek.

‘No, Subhi, you’re wrong. A sparrow in the house doesn’t mean death. It means change. Waking up new and starting again. Subhi, a sparrow in the house is a sign of hope.’