It was nice to sit on the El Bodega pavement in the warm June air, especially when the evening brought with it a gentle breeze. Silence prevailed when a pretty girl walked by, but Isa and his friends were by no means tired of talking about politics. Even though Abbas Sadiq had a position in the government, and Ibrahim Khairat worked as a lawyer and writer for the revolution, they still held the same views as Isa or Samir Abd al-Baqi, who tended to be reticent. Ibrahim summed up their general feelings. “It’s right there in your hands, and then someone else gets it!” he said.
Signs of resignation were written all over their faces, but they still hoped for a miracle. Sometimes they would seize on the most trivial news, and a hidden flicker of life would rouse in the barren wasteland of their hearts. Incredibly enough, Ibrahim Khairat and Abbas Sadiq were even more disgruntled than Isa.
“One of you is an important writer,” Isa told them with a laugh, “and the other is an important civil servant. So what do you want?”
“On a personal level,” Abbas replied in his ringing and harmonious voice, his eyes flashing wide, “things may be reassuring; but that doesn’t alter the general picture.”
“The truth is,” said Ibrahim Khairat, “no one has any value today, however senior his position may be. We’re a country of bubbles.”
“When I was only in the sixth grade,” Abbas said, “I was as good as an entire ministry!”
“Nothing bothers me anymore,” said Samir Abd al-Baqi with a soothing tone of resignation.
“But your position is at least as difficult as any of ours!”
Samir hurriedly revised his statement of his views. “I meant that I’m no longer troubled by regrets about the past. Sometimes I wish them success. My own dismissal doesn’t bother me because I chose it.”
“You mean, it was imposed on you,” said Isa jokingly.
“But, at the same time, I chose it. May God’s will be done.”
Ibrahim Khairat rubbed Isa’s shoulder. “Why aren’t you saying anything?” he asked. “Haven’t you any news?”
“A few days ago,” Isa said simply, “I hung a ‘For Sale’ sign on my late mother’s house.”
“It’s old, but at least it’s land!”
“My share of it will enable me to live like a notable,” Isa said joyfully, “and that’s how I’ll carry on for as long as possible.”
“Do you think that’s a decent way to live?”
“Maybe it’ll cure me of my split personality.”
“Is that some modern illness?” asked Abbas Sadiq.
“The truth is,” replied Isa after thinking for a moment, “although my mind is sometimes convinced by the revolution, my heart is always with the past. I just don’t know if there can be any settlement between the two.”
“It isn’t a question of principles to be convinced by,” said Ibrahim Khairat. “The relationship between ruler and ruled is regulated secretly, just as in love. We can say that the ruler who will be most attractive to his subjects is the one who respects their humanity the most. Man shall not live by bread alone!”
“But that’s why I should still be out of work, even if I got scores of jobs,” Isa replied sadly.
“Is that your heart or your mind speaking?” Abbas Sadiq asked.
“The heart means totally different things to us,” Samir Abd al-Baqi said with a smile.
“Why are we laughing,” Isa asked, “when life is a tragedy in every sense of the word?”
“We think of death as the ultimate tragedy,” said Ibrahim Khairat, “and yet the death of the living is infinitely worse than that of the dead.”
Abbas Sadiq gave an explosive laugh. “Isn’t it appropriate,” he said, “that the conversation should take us from death to the atom!”
Isa had still not fully emerged from his sudden feeling of sorrow. “One of the things about using the atom as a threat,” he said, “is that it lightens life’s drudgery; I mean, our life…”
“What about modern civilization?” Abbas Sadiq asked sarcastically. “Aren’t you worried about what may happen to it?”
“Fortunately for us, we haven’t entered the world of modern civilization yet. So why should we be afraid of getting wet?”
“I hope it’ll be an age like the flood,” Ibrahim Khairat said. “Then the earth will be purified.”
“Have you heard that from an official source?” Abbas Sadiq asked.
“Let’s admit,” said Samir Abd al-Baqi, “that if it weren’t for death, our life wouldn’t have any value at all.”
“What a lot of talk about death!”
At that, Isa remembered his mother’s death, Salwa’s marriage to Hasan, and the harsh way he had treated Riri. How consoling it was, he thought, to be able to chat with these friends of his. Talking to Hasan only made his split personality even more acute. Samir leaned toward him. “Your problem’s easy compared with the problems of the world,” he said. “You need a job and a wife.”
“That’s why I like horror films,” Isa replied with no obvious connection.
“The trouble with those films,” Abbas Sadiq commented, “is that they’re imaginary.”
“On the contrary,” Isa replied, “the trouble with them is that they’re too realistic.”
The air-raid siren went off by mistake and blared for half a minute. Isa thought that eventually he would find himself searching for a job and a woman. But that would not happen till he admitted defeat and made a final exit from history.