The House of Jasmine (10 page)

The door is now open and I do not see Ahlam. Who is this little dark girl standing in the door?

“Who is it, Nur?” called a voice from inside. It sounded like Kawthar's voice, with its distinctive hoarseness, which I can always recognize. So this little girl looking up at me was named Nur. What a distance there was between my eyes and hers.

“Who are you?” she asked quite casually. I smiled at her, but didn't reply. She ran inside, and I heard her say, “Mom, it is a very tall man who doesn't talk at all!”

I didn't hear footsteps, but I saw Kawthar in front of me with her feet bare. Her blonde hair fell loosely down her back, but she no longer had her sweet fragrance.

“Shagara! I mean, Mr. Shagara, please come in.”

8

There is always a huge crowd on al-Tarikh Bridge every Wednesday. Young and old men and children in rags and bare feet start to arrive in the early morning and line up on the bridge with their faces toward the port, their gazes fixed on the empty space. The tram stops at its station behind them, and no one leaves his spot until evening.

A long time after this started happening, the people realized that there was an incinerator at the port where the police burned drugs they had confiscated after stopping smuggling attempts or raiding dealers' storage places. Wednesday was the day on which the burning took place, and the sea breeze blowing at the bridge always passed the incinerator and, carrying the smoke of burning hashish, brought the people on the bridge pleasure and comfort free of charge. Now many vehicles besides the tram loiter on the bridge on Wednesdays.

I was sitting in my office thinking of how women lived longer than men because God wanted them to suffer longer. Why did God want His beautiful creatures to suffer? I felt that my mind was about to burst, and I was scared. . .

Kawthar's mother had cried when she saw me. Her husband, ‘Abd al-‘Al, had died of sorrow for Hani, who was killed in Sinai during the war. Mr. ‘Abd al-‘Al was a distinguished person in the neighborhood. He was a handsome man who had passed his good looks down to his daughters. He was always clean and nicely dressed, and wore a full suit in both winter and summer. He was a quiet man who talked very little. He often came into the room where Hani and I used to study in the evenings, opened a small closet with a key that he kept, took out a small book and left. Hani used to talk to me about his father's wide knowledge of poets and poetry.

Nur, Kawthar's little girl, was dark because her father, who left her and two other children and went to work in Dubai, was dark. Where is this Dubai on the world map? And how can I get to it now? Ahlam had quietly married a month ago and left for Dubai with her husband as well. Maybe Ahlam was married on the same day on which I saw Kawthar in the tram.

Why did I not expect all this? Why did I forget that there had been a big war in October 1973, and that many people had been killed in this war? Was it because ‘Abd al-Salam, who was besieged with the third army, had returned safely? Was ‘Abd al-Salam our entire army?

Why did I not realize that as Ahlam grew up she also matured and came to have her own magic and secret world? As soon as I had entered the apartment, I had a sudden cold impression that I didn't really know anyone there, and that feeling didn't surprise me. If you lose something and then find it again when you don't need it anymore, does it mean anything? Kawthar must have felt the same way. She sat down and smiled, then got up and brought her mother, leaning on her arm, to sit with us. We sat in silence, and all the mother said was: “How are you, son?” Then she started to weep quietly. Kawthar helped her up, and took her out of the room, then came back to say that her mother never stopped crying. So it was not seeing me that made her cry as I had thought. It was not that I reminded her of her son, his childhood and early youth. I didn't feel like talking to Kawthar about anything, and she didn't ask me about my parents. I don't think that she even wondered about the cause of my strange visit. When we had been silent for too long, I started to ask questions, and the answers were like blows on my head. Did Kawthar think that I knew every misfortune that happened to them? I didn't ask her about Rashid. If Hani, who never stopped joking and laughing, was dead, then Rashid, who used to memorize and sing ‘Abd al-Halim's songs, must have been suffering in the “Loyalty and Hope” institution for the disabled. Is life a tasteless farce or a futile tragedy? I wasn't surprised that Kawthar had smiled at me in the tram. She must have remembered that this tall man in front of her was once her neighbor, and maybe she remembered that I had kissed her once, and she thought of her husband and enjoyed a pleasant moment. She probably didn't expect anything more than a smile in return.

#

I was struck by a frenzy of desire, so I went around our shipyard offices peeking at the legs of the female employees. I sat with the ones I knew and chatted in order to get a look at the breasts tucked inside their clothes and smell their cheap and heavy perfumes. I imagined them in sexual positions with their husbands, whom I either knew if they worked in our shipyard or didn't know. At home, I created an imaginary palace of sexual pleasures and got so good at my fantasizing that I could ejaculate without touching myself.

When al-Dakruri came to visit me, he was horrified to see my long beard and my bushy unbrushed hair, which had not been washed in a long time.

“Shagara, you should get married,” he said. A sarcastic smile came to my face.

“You have an apartment, so what are you waiting for? You are in a better position than I am.”

I did not reply.

“Money? It's on its way. Prepare yourself. Begin has arrived in Alexandria, as you know, and the day after tomorrow he will leave Ras al-Tin Palace to go to the President's summer house in Ma'mura. The shipyard will participate in greeting them on Gamal ‘Abd al-Nassir Street.

Screw him!
I almost screamed at al-Dakruri, almost picked him up and threw him out the window into the back street. He knew everything about me and didn't object or ask for anything in return for his silence. What kind of a person was he? He was not a saint, an angel, or a devil. He didn't deserve to be thanked or cursed. And who was I, exactly? I didn't even know that Begin had arrived in Alexandria. I no longer read any newspapers or watched television news programs. I was on a quest for women, women's scents, sweat, lips, breasts, and I was thinking of buying a color television set in order to look at their warm flesh. This Begin was the one who had thrown God out of His land where the government housing in Kum al-Shuqafa stood, and he was the one who filled the area with a shanty town.

I'm not an idiot, as you all must think. I understand how things work. I really do. I only have one modest desire—I want to find a woman to marry. Then I would become even more isolated, my life would revolve around her and our children, and I would become even more stupid. This is the desire which has never been fulfilled, and which I have always tried to ignore. I'm Shagara Muhammad ‘Ali, the tall dark man with the attractive face and the black eyes, strong as a wall, manhood running thick in my veins, almost bursting out of my skin, turning my blood into fire, and pouring out effortlessly. I have an apartment and more than five hundred pounds in my bank account. I have no relatives, and both my parents are dead. I, Shagara Muhammad ‘Ali, cannot find a woman. Isn't there one single girl courageous enough to come forward and end my loneliness? Isn't there one of my colleagues who could present a friend or a sister that I could marry? Why have women given up their historical role of trying to secure a man for themselves? And they want me to participate in Begin's reception? Shit! I will receive Begin and Begin's mother! I will make the employees like him. I won't steal any of their pay this time. I will sit at the café near the train station, and leave them in the street, in the square in front of the station, where the buildings are far apart and the sunlight scorches the ground without a single spot of shade. I will carry out this dirty mission to the end.

#

The door bell rang, and I opened it to find Hassanayn standing there with his arms open and his face as flushed as ever. I was very happy to see him.

“I received my B.A.,” he said. It was the first time that any of my friends had visited me at home since my mother's death. We hugged, and I wasn't sure whether I was hugging him because he had received his degree or because he was visiting me.

“I'm happy for you and for myself,” I said. “For your graduation and for your visit.” We were standing in the empty hallway, so I led him to the balcony, where there was an old chair, and I brought another chair for myself.

“It's true that we haven't been very good to you,” he said with real sorrow in his voice.

“Don't worry about it,” I said. “Congratulations on your B.A.” He was looking at my thick beard, the dark circles of exhaustion around my eyes and the swelling beneath them, which was due to insomnia and excessive smoking.

“I will shave for your sake,” I said. Then I went to the bathroom, shaved, and returned to find him with a big smile on his red face. He must have been wondering at the way I behaved.

“Between you and me, I think it's worthless,” he said.

“What is?”

“The B.A.” We both laughed, then he went on: “I'm thirty-six, and my salary now is higher than that of any new university graduate. The important thing is that I'm through with wars and conspiracies, with studying history.”

We laughed for a few moments. He seemed to be refreshed by the view of the sea before us. I asked him if he wanted something to drink, and he said no. Then he asked if we could go to the café.

“I went to the café more than once, and didn't find any of you there,” he said.

“Why didn't you go see Magid at the pharmacy or come here?”

He looked as if he were at a loss at how to answer, and he blushed, then said, “I don't know.”

We got up to go to the café, and I said, “We no longer function according to the same secret clock.”

But shortly after we arrived at the café, we saw Magid coming. Hassanayn looked as happy as a small child, and he cried, “Here we are again, getting together without any plans.” Hassanayn seemed to be truly overjoyed, nothing like the person ‘Abd al-Salam had once described as permanently contented, enjoying the bliss of contentment and avoiding all of the more powerful emotions.

“Many people like to stick to smooth roads, even if they don't lead anywhere,” ‘Abd al-Salam had once said. “The important thing isn't where they lead, but that they are smooth. Maybe it's also a matter of age, because after thirty the level of ambition decreases and people's lives fall into a pattern, which they only break if they go insane.”

“Hassanayn has received his B.A.,” I told Magid after we hugged.

“Congratulations. Now you will start making real history!” Magid said with a wide smile. Then he laughed and added, “Don't you dare ask me about Cairo and the school of natural science!”

Hassanayn and I looked at each other. Magid had just reminded us of a long-forgotten matter. We both cried at once, “So you found her?”

“Of course I did.”

“Boy! I bet she couldn't believe all the trouble you went through,” I said.

“Of course she didn't,” Magid said, then turned to the waiter and said, “Bring us a backgammon board, Muhsin.”

“Wait a minute,” I said. “First tell us how you found her, and what happened.” Magid took off his glasses, started wiping them, then said without looking up at us: “I never found her. I was just joking. The whole thing was crazy, anyway. Now I'm studying German at the Goethe Institute. I'll be traveling to Austria.”

#

Magid told us that he had bought a used Fiat and was planning to drive us around the city at night. He also said that Dr. Musa, who worked in the pharmacy with him, had secured a job for himself in Kuwait, and that he was now satisfied, was working hard, and treating the customers nicely.

I told them about something that had happened in my building recently. Two weeks earlier, I had heard a noise on the stairs. I was excited at the thought of another resident moving in. I hadn't seen a single resident in the building from the summer of 1976 until the summer of this year, 1979. I didn't know what all the tenants were doing abroad for so long. For three whole years, I had locked the entrance to the building every night. . . I opened the door and, as I expected, saw delivery men carrying new furniture. I stood on the stairs for a moment listening to the sound of footsteps coming up and the carefree laughs of a young couple, who soon came up to where I was. There was an older woman who looked like she could be the girl's mother. I was embarrassed at my intrusion and ashamed of my shaggy beard, but I remained standing on the stairs outside my apartment.

“Do you live here?” the young man, who had very thick hair, asked me.

“Yes.”

“Then you must be Mr. Shagara,” said the girl with a smile as she looked up at me. I realized that
‘
Abdu al-Fakahani must have told them about me and given them a key to the front door. I also realized that it must have been
‘
Abdu who gave the police a key on the night when they came to arrest me. Maybe that was why he had seemed to be afraid of me when I went to see him after I was released, and maybe he thought that I was really dangerous. But that was an old story, and I should not have bothered with it anymore. Besides, the police would have gotten in with or without the key.

“Yes,” I finally answered.

“Do you live alone, son?” asked the mother.

“Yes.”

“Then you will let us enjoy your company,” they all said at once, and then laughed. I smiled, but felt myself blush. I also felt that they were a bunch of barbarians. I'm not sure how I felt about them exactly. . . I was almost dancing with joy in my apartment for the rest of the day, for no matter what they were, they were still people who were going to live with me in this huge building. Besides, I saw the girl's face become a bit pale after they all laughed. It was Friday, and I was getting ready to go fishing. I had bought some fishing equipment but I had not used it yet. I didn't even use it that day, but never mind. I will use it some day. I took off my clothes and put on my bathing suit, but then I didn't actually leave. I kept going out to the balcony and listening to the sounds of moving furniture on the floor above. I kept looking up, and one of them was always looking out from the balcony above mine. I was embarrassed every time our eyes met, but the other person always smiled and waved at me. I thought that I was going crazy, and that they were too. They should have at least found my nakedness distasteful, especially because their balcony was about half a meter smaller than mine and allowed them to see me fully.