Page 47 of Counting Backwards

“I started early,” Fern said as she held up the coffee cup in her hand and pushed one of the mugs on the wrought-iron table to the side. “We might as well get straight to business.” She motioned for me to sit down, took her own seat, then poured hot coffee into the cup in front of me. “What is it you wanted to know?”

“I went to see Jacinta. Thank you,” I added, taking the cup. “We met at her home in Brooklyn. I brought an interpreter and heard about the procedure she underwent. We’re going to file a complaint in federal court.”

Fern offered little more than a nod in response, but I thought I saw a flicker of satisfaction cross the woman’s face.

“So what else do you need from me?” she asked. “Sounds like you’re all set.” She glanced back toward the door to the house.

“Jacinta doesn’t want to do it alone. She’ll probably back out if we can’t get others to join the complaint, and then we’ll be nowhere. I don’t think I can help the women at Hydeford, or the ones who come after them, unless I have a fuller picture of what’s going on. I also need a better understanding of what’s happened to women who were there in the past.”

“And what makes you think I’d be able to help you? Or that I’d be willing?” Fern asked. “I did my part.” She pulled at her gray parka, tightening it around herself as if physically holding in whatever information she might have.

“Nurses always know more about what’s going on with patients than anyone else,” I said, repeating what Dalia had pointed out the week before. “And the fact that you’ve chosen to work as a nurse tells me you care about helping people. You’re not going to sit by and do nothing while women are at risk.” I hoped those words were true.

Fern sipped her coffee but didn’t answer.

I stayed quiet too, my heart beginning to race as I worried I’d hit another dead end. But then I had a thought. “How long have you been working for ICE?” I asked.

“I don’t work for ICE,” Fern said. “Hydeford is a privately run facility. I work for DeMarke Corrections, an outside company. The government hired them to run the place. I’m pretty sure that’s how it works at most detention centers these days. DeMarke runs more of these centers than anyone else, and they could have put me anywhere. I requested Hydeford because it’s closest to where I live.”

I hadn’t even known the facility was privately run. Realizing that I’d been ignorant of such a basic and important detail was another blow to my confidence, jolting me awake to the fact that I still needed to learn so much—not only about this particular case, but also about the nuts and bolts of detention in the US. I’d recently become aware that the government often hired private contractors to help with various aspects of immigration detention, but I hadn’t realized the entire operation at Hydeford could be for-profit. Knowing now that I was dealing with a business enterprise, I wondered more seriously about the kind of insurance reimbursements they must be getting for all the medical procedures happening there.

“Can you tell me how medical treatment generally works at the facility?” I asked, hoping the open-ended question would get Fern talking.

“I can’t lose my job,” she said. “My husband’s been out of work near two years. He’s helping out on some construction jobs, but we’ve got three kids. You know how teenaged boys eat? I can’t lose my job,” she said again.

“I understand,” I told her. “I’m not asking you to get involved. Just maybe point me in the right direction. Tell me who else to talk to?”

“I don’t know if anybody else would be willing. Some women in the past have filed grievances. But then you see those women get deported back to their countries, sometimes the next day, sometimes only hours later. The other women see it too. Makes it so people want to keep quiet, you know?”

“How is that even possible?” I wondered aloud. “To make the deportations happen so quickly? Aren’t there protocols? Last I heard, it could take weeks to even get an asthma inhaler in one of these places, yet somehow they can ship a woman off like it’s nothing?”

“I imagine if they get those women to file a request saying they want to be sent back to their origin country, arrangements can be made very quickly.” She looked off toward the yard next door. “The guards just have to persuade them to say they don’t actually want to stay in the US after all.”

So now there was coercion to add to the complaint too. I felt a pounding in my head.

“Can you tell me about Dr. Choudry?” I asked, switching gears.

Fern swallowed audibly. “She works at Pinelands Women’s Health. It’s an outside facility the women go to. They have a contract with DeMarke, and all the women go there when they need medical visits. Choudry’s been there a few years. From what I hear, she’s not even board-certified.”

“Have you ever been there, to Pinelands?”

Fern shuddered. “You couldn’t pay me to step foot in that place.”

“Why?” I sipped my coffee and tried not to grimace at the bitterness of it. Something about it tasted off.

“You should see the women when they come back from the place. Shell-shocked, bandaged, confused. Lots of the women don’t speak English, don’t even know what happened to them. I wonder near every day how many women still don’t know exactly what was done to them over there.”

“Why does it continue? Who allows it?” I couldn’t keep the incredulity from my voice.

“The people who run DeMarke, I guess.” Fern said it like she wasn’t very sure. “Sometimes I think they’re just punishing the women for trying to find their place in the good ole US of A. God forbid they should have the right to live how they want.” Fern was getting worked up, confirming my suspicion that she cared more than she’d initially let on.

At the sound of the slider opening, I twisted around to see a brown-haired boy, about thirteen years old, poking his head out the door.

“Mom, where’d you put my cleats?”

“They’re at the front door, Pete, right where you left them last night.” Fern sighed and glanced at me.

As the boy closed the door, I hoped Fern would continue what she’d been saying, but she was quiet a moment and then just pushed back her chair.