Hidden Colours Read online

  Copyright

  www.EvolvedPub.com

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  HIDDEN COLOURS

  Copyright © 2018 Nillu Nasser

  Cover Art Copyright © 2018 Dale Robert Pease

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  ISBN (EPUB Version): 1622537823

  ISBN-13 (EPUB Version): 978-1-62253-782-2

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  Editor: Jessica West

  Interior Designer: Lane Diamond

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  eBook License Notes:

  You may not use, reproduce or transmit in any manner, any part of this book without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations used in critical articles and reviews, or in accordance with federal Fair Use laws. All rights are reserved.

  This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only; it may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, please return to your eBook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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  Disclaimer:

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination, or the author has used them fictitiously.

  Books by Nillu Nasser

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  All the Tomorrows

  Hidden Colours

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  www.NilluNasser.com

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  What Others Are Saying about Nillu Nasser’s award winner, ALL THE TOMORROWS:

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  “Nillu Nasser is a gifted and a great entertainer. This novel is balanced and utterly engrossing.” ~ Romuald Dzemo, Readers’ Favorite Book Reviews

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  “An involving story of the tides and trajectories of love.” ~ Diane Donovan, Midwest Book Review

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  “Rich in engaging, realistic characters who grab readers’ hearts and minds and don’t let them go till all the story is told. And what a story it is!” ~ Viga Boland, Readers’ Favorite Book Reviews

  BONUS CONTENT

  We’re pleased to offer you not one, but two Special Sneak Previews at the end of this book.

  ~~~

  In the first preview, you’ll enjoy the First 2 Chapters of the first book in Taya DeVere’s “Borderline” series, BETWEEN TWO DOORS.

  ~~~

  ~~~

  OR GRAB THE FULL EBOOK TODAY!

  YOU’LL FIND LINKS TO YOUR FAVORITE RETAILER HERE:

  TAYA DEVERE’S Books at Evolved Publishing

  In the second preview, you’ll enjoy the First 3 Chapters of the literary/women’s fiction PARTICIPANT by Carmen Kemp.

  ~~~

  OR GRAB THE FULL EBOOK TODAY!

  YOU’LL FIND LINKS TO YOUR FAVORITE RETAILER HERE:

  CARMEN KEMP at Evolved Publishing

  Dedication

  For my parents,

  who are born helpers.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Books by Nillu Nasser

  BONUS CONTENT

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Book Club Guide

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  What’s Next?

  More from Nillu Nasser

  More from Evolved Publishing

  Special Sneak Preview: BETWEEN TWO DOORS by Taya DeVere

  Special Sneak Preview: PARTICIPANT by Carmen Kemp

  Chapter 1

  Nestled in the far-east corner of Treptower Park, past the abandoned funfair with its rusting dodgems and the Ferris wheel overcome by climbing ivy, stood a midnight blue and bronze tent. It didn’t look like much—particularly tonight, when the inky sky blotted out the stars—but each evening at the stroke of seven, the circus came stutteringly to life.

  From the moment the circus materialised, it transformed the landscape. Once in full flow, the emerald grasses vibrated with the rhythm of the house band. The winds carried peculiar scents far afield. Nostrils twitched when exotic odours replaced altogether familiar ones. Walking deep into the park, the waft of smoking sausages on summer barbecues or the tang of wet autumn earth disappeared, leaving only the scent of sawdust, sugared almonds and a fog of incense.

  This was a circus for all seasons. Whether birds chirped in the park, great gusts of wind rocked the boughs, snow crunched underfoot, or thunder pulsed across the Berlin skies, the big top beckoned like a mirage. If curious individuals followed their feet towards the tent, they found sticky trestle tables outside it, where adults clinked glasses and children slurped pink concoctions through winding straws.

  Here and there, between the patrons, clusters of performers lingered in full costume: young women in shimmering leotards with plumes of feathers attached to their rears; a clown with a magnificent bowtie that seemed to increase and decrease in size as you watched; stilt-walkers who roamed the lawn in between faded dinosaur figures and could be confused for great oaks. Neither the performers’ faces nor their accents stemmed from Europe. A strangeness pervaded this circus, an other-worldliness. The circus people gathered at the banks of the River Spree to play stones, a ritual to dispel their nerves. They disrupted the calm surface of the river with a flurry of ripples, and became animated at the sound of an eerie gong to summon them to their starting positions.

  Tonight, a sparse crowd filled the tent amidst a jumble of fairy-lights, sawdust and clattering seats. Close to half of the stands stood empty. The immigrant circus, as it was known locally, was no longer Berlin’s newest curiosity, but no matter. The spectacle didn’t dim. Three girls in long flowing skirts paced through the tent, holding jasmine-scented incense sticks aloft, their hair in swinging pony-tails. Parents shushed their excitable, popcorn-popping children. A group of women celebrated a hen night and attracted the attention of four boozy men sitting in the row behind.

  The microphone boomed as Emir the ringmaster, rotund and buoyant, his moustache thick like a bristle brush, entered the ring. He plumped out his ruffled shirt and tipped his tatty top hat. “Ladies and gentleman, boys and girls, welcome to the circus. We’ll dazzle you, we’ll enchant you, we’ll make you rub your eyes in wonder. You’ll be transformed by what you see. It’s showtime!”

  The performance commenced with a display from gleaming horses which galloped into the ring unaccompanied. The audience gasped when the three girls in their midst set aside the incense sticks and climbed onto the rafters. They leapt and, for a moment, appeare
d to pause in flight before landing on the bare-backed steeds, racing around the ring until beast and beauty became a whirr of hooves and skirts. Wild applause whipped through the big top.

  There followed a giant man, more nimble than he looked, leading a troupe of goats in a merry dance, and the goats danced in pairs, courting each other, and seemed to waltz and tango, such was their magic. Next, a woman slid down aerial silks, bending her limbs at impossible angles with the gracefulness of a willow tree before cocooning herself and disappearing a breath later.

  So, the evening hurtled forward at break-neck speed, the circus-goers cheering and quietening by turns as the artists turned their tricks into spectacle.

  High above the unfolding acts, Yusuf shook with nerves, as he did every night.

  Emir reclaimed the microphone, his voice a foghorn of exuberance. “Next up, it’s the man—nay, the star—you’ve been waiting for! He can leap. He can somersault through the air. He can land like a cat. Our resident acrobat, Herr Yusuf Alam!”

  Not for the first time, Yusuf wondered whether the performers should change their names to be more palatable to this audience.

  Less strange.

  For Yusuf and the motley troupe who had become his family, the circus wasn’t merely a performance. The big top that flared above them might have been an inanimate object, but it symbolised the chance of a new life. After he’d fled Syria, he hadn’t thought he’d ever find another home, until the circus found him. The performers forged new ties because without each other, they had nobody. The circus had become a lifeboat, as if they were still making the treacherous journey across the globe away from disease, war and uncertainty. As if the twinkling lights of the tent amounted to the North Star.

  If only the city kept her arms open.

  He’d arrived in Berlin two years ago, an alien being adrift in a foreign landscape with its own stinking history of violence and hatred. Grief knotted with gratitude at the centre of his chest. Two years had passed since he’d seen his mother and filled his belly with her stewed curries that stained his fingers. Two years since war threw their lives off track and imposed its will on them as if they were nothing more than flies.

  “And here he comes!” said Emir the ringmaster, drunk on energy.

  Yusuf locked away the errant thoughts that flooded his mind and slipped into his acrobat’s skin. He smoothed down his costume and stepped out onto the beam, high above the spectators. The moment of jumping always overwhelmed him. Each time he jumped, his experience divided into two halves: the fear of falling and the joy of flying. Sometimes, when he leapt through the tent with his acrobat’s grace, the weightlessness of flight—for a nanosecond—removed the burden of his memories. Tonight, not even the thought of momentary release helped. He didn’t want to do this. He scanned the crowd. The faces of strangers blurred into a mist. His heart clamoured in his chest.

  Will I ever be safe?

  He wobbled. The roar of the wind at the top of the tent echoed in his ears as he regained his composure. He balanced, body taut. Better to pause and let the crowd imagine him falling for an instant. He blinked to shake the image from his own mind, his legs suddenly like jelly.

  Yusuf leapt, and when he did, the spectators held their breath—a suspended moment, like after the shells landed in Syria. He somersaulted through the air, spinning like a top, and a shower of stardust raced after him, microscopic particles twinkling in his wake. He gave himself to the freedom of the fall, although he quivered with fear and his people were dying, still. When he landed, dust swept into the air, reminding him of the dry earth at home, which sometimes became wet with rains or blood.

  The audience burst into applause.

  Chapter 2

  A billowing cloud of sawdust floated to the ground. Yusuf stood in the glare of the spotlight and bowed low to the stands to acknowledge the crowd’s rapturous reception, though he didn’t care for the wild applause. He longed for a greater connection than this, to be rooted in this country and bonded to its people, to shed the skin of his own ragged history. Pearls of sweat pooled between his shoulder blades. He bowed once more, lycra slick against his skin, to those who had no idea how lucky they were with their white faces, here in the most powerful country in Europe.

  The house band swung into action in a rousing melody of Middle-East poetry meets Berlin hip-hop. Inside his body, cavernous parts echoed with the energy of the music, igniting a sense of urgency in him. Yusuf’s blood ran quicker with the beat and he darted to the edge of the arena. The tambourine, goblet drum and fiddle vied for attention with Najib’s beat-boxing, lips alive at the microphone, dead eyes above.

  He sent a silent message to Najib. Focus.

  Right now, it was showtime. This magical, fragile home of theirs couldn’t afford any complaints. The circus needed to excel. They needed all their concentration, all their tricks and spirit to outperform their competition and attract visitors.

  Emir the ringmaster clapped his hands, and the lights blacked out. The tent fizzed with anticipation. The lights flared and in came the twins, sequinned from head to toe, riding bareback on their horses, dove-tailing, leaping, turning slow, sensual flips, though their father would have turned in his grave. Zul the Clown bumbled into the ring, feigning flatulence to the hilarity of the children, his polka-dotted flat cap turning on his head of its own accord. Next, a lute rang out through the air, sweet and clear, as Amena, Aya and Aischa returned. Resplendent in the new costumes they had sewn, they performed a folk dance with spinning skirts, casting threads of gold into the air. Meanwhile, Esme—pretty in a ruched moonlight gown, her hair shrouded by a headscarf—offered warm chunks of manoushi bread and baklawa to the audience.

  Onwards continued the show, like clockwork.

  The girls danced not five feet away from him, round and round, and their movements hypnotised. Yusuf’s eyes blurred and he retreated into a memory of his mother. He recalled the comfort of her calloused hand on his face, how it would linger there as if he were a child and not a grown man. How he missed her, even surrounded by his new family. His mother had wanted him to be a surgeon or a lawyer. She’d stayed in the land of their ancestors, too old and tired to make the journey, too reluctant to give up her past. She didn’t know how her remaining son contorted himself into shapes and spun through the air to please strangers. Even now, he could almost feel the vice-like grip of her fingers on his arms, the salty tears threading a pathway across the creases of her skin. Her parting words to him had been branded into his psyche.

  Do what you must to survive, but never forget who we are.

  He owed it to her to make a go of this life. All around him, his fellow performers dazzled with colour, song and razzmatazz, spirit and skill. He knew happiness here, especially with the circus in full motion, with his newly-made family in a flurry of activity around him and the satisfaction of a seamless show. Here, in the tents, the performers controlled their world.

  Soon it would be time for the finale when the performers flooded the arena once more: the acrobats, clowns, stilt- and tightrope-walkers, leaping horses and dancing goats. The world would shrink to a point inside the big top, and all around there would be the energy of a dozen planets and colours stolen from Allah himself. It would feel like a wedding in Syria, when the village came together and his face hurt from smiling, his feet ached from all the dancing, and his cheeks flushed with heat. The finale was when the circus most felt like home, when they were together like they belonged. Misfits and broken people who had only become whole once they found their way together like magnets.

  Suddenly, a shout pierced through the serenity of the lute.

  An audience member called out, puncturing the dream-like trance of Amena, Aya and Aischa’s dance. Again it came, brash and unapologetic, a dose of reality crashing into the fantastical realm they had toiled to create. Anxiety bubbled in Yusuf’s stomach and his eyebrows snapped together as he strained to hear the precise words.

  The man lurched forward in his seat, red-faced
and drunk, although they didn’t serve alcohol here. “Go on, you monkeys! Dance!”

  Yusuf’s skin prickled with fear. The disrespect shown to his friends—to them all—wounded him deeply, but they could neither censure nor retaliate, powerless as they were.

  The man hadn’t yet finished, and the audience around him looked away, aghast. “Dance, dance ‘til you drop, then we can put you back in your boats where you belong. Rats, the lot of you!”

  Yusuf itched with the need to restrain him, but how could he when bound by the rules of gratitude for being allowed to live in this country, and by the rules of hospitality to a paying member of the audience? He looked to Emir’s impassive face at the side of the ring. How far would they allow insults to go before taking action?

  The girls continued dancing as if they were dolls, not real flesh capable of hurt. Esme—an Afghani girl, who was sweet on Yusuf—stood closer to the fray. The man’s shouts startled her and she dropped her tray of food over herself and into an audience member’s bag. Her moonlight dress dimmed, and she flushed and stooped to undo the damage, all the while whispering apologies to the woman she knelt before. The man crowed and settled back into his seat, pleased with himself.

  A ruckus like this set them all on edge and chased the magic away. Bad enough that circus attendance had been dwindling. Worse, disturbances such as these had increased and had resulted in additional scrutiny from the Interior Ministry. With any luck, no one with any clout had been there to witness it. The Interior Minister’s aide, all corkscrew curls and a hooked nose, had been an increasingly regular visitor to the circus in recent months, and that in itself had raised concerns.

  Yusuf swivelled and blinked to adjust to the glare of the lights.

  Damn.

  His heartbeat accelerated and his palms grew sweaty. There sat Rex Silberling himself: Interior Minister, the Chancellor’s right-hand man, and architect of the circus. Tonight, his aide flapped next to Silberling as he sat still and grim-faced in his house seat, power rolling off him in waves. She motioned to Silberling’s security men not to intervene in the disturbance: the drunk man had already settled down.