During the days that followed, he tried to go straight. He went from home to college, from college to home or sometimes to his friends’ house, but nowhere else. It comforted him to behave like this. His conscience eased and he felt peace and contentment return. Now, when he pictured his mother’s face, it was clearly smiling. But despite the pangs it caused him, there was one thing he could not get out of his mind: Raqiyya’s body, and its wild, tangled triangle. Whenever images of that soft brown body flickered across his mind, the exciting feeling of pleasure returned, and he felt lust creep into every part of his body, blotting out all painful feelings of remorse.
These images began to frighten him. He saw them whenever he walked to his friends’ house and caught sight of Muhaysin’s window in the distance. When he was alone in his own room, Raqiyya’s image forced itself upon him and every limb in his body stiffened. He went looking for Abd al-Rahman in the hope that he could make another date with her, but stopped himself at the last moment. He would go straight whatever the sacrifices.
But whenever he talked to Abd al-Rahman he felt his resistance waning. His cousin had seen Raqiyya several times and reported that she was always asking after him. Abd al-Rahman laughed and added, ‘I don’t know what you did for her … or to her. She never stops asking about you – she’s quite insistent.’ He winked and laughed. Hisham didn’t know whether Abd al-Rahman was exaggerating or telling the truth, but he still felt proud and elated by this lavish praise. Every cell in his body yearned for Raqiyya; her damp, wild triangle never left his mind, despite all the painful remorse it caused him merely to picture the ugly thing. And he had felt deeply ashamed since picturing his mother’s face framed by Raqiyya’s triangle in a dream.
One night he was revising for his first formal examination. The whole place was in total silence; everyone was asleep. This late at night, all he could hear was the sound of wild dogs patrolling the streets. They got nearer, then further away. He couldn’t concentrate; Raqiyya commandeered his thoughts. He was supposed to be memorising the fluctuations of supply and demand, and how they varied with any change of circumstance, but the graphs made him think of things entirely unconnected with economics. He was boiling hot, though the weather in Riyadh was quite moderate for that time in July and his fan was revolving quietly and slowly. He needed some fresh air, so he got up from his chair, drew it under the window and looked out at the empty street. He watched the dogs chasing one another, competing for food and bitches. Shutting his eyes, he filled his lungs with air – wishing it were as fresh to breathe as the desert air in Nejd. He felt pleasantly intoxicated – though he’d drunk nothing – and utterly tranquil. He was about to collapse into bed, when something in the window of the house opposite caught his eye. It was half-closed, and a curious pale light filtered through its transparent shutters. It surprised him that anyone should be awake at this late hour of the night. The principles of economics beckoned, but a movement through the shutters made him stay where he was and look more closely. What he saw made his heart beat faster, and his whole body stiffen and drip with sweat: a man and a woman, completely naked, having sex. He was transfixed by the sight, and watched, spellbound, until the man was spent. Hisham watched as he got up and left the room while the woman lay motionless, her eyes fixed on the window. For one terrifying moment he thought she was looking straight at him. She had seen him spying on her. He turned his face from the window, but the temptation was too strong, and he gazed out again. She was still lying there, looking at the window, but now she seemed to be smiling. He couldn’t move. He was paralysed. Then the man came back, at which point the woman got up and left the room, then came back and turned off the light so that Hisham could no longer see anything. He got down from the window and threw himself on the bed, extremely aroused. He saw nothing but the woman’s buttocks and breasts. Then, suddenly, he was afraid. What if the woman had seen him spying on their most intimate and private act? They were neighbours, and would know his uncle and his family. Would they complain about him to his uncle? That would be a disaster. His perfect record would collapse in front of his uncle and Moudhi – his uncle might even tell Hisham’s family! It would break his mother’s heart and destroy his father’s trust.
But the woman hadn’t moved or looked embarrassed when she saw him spying from the window … perhaps she hadn’t seen him, and he had just imagined it. After all she’d done nothing to hide her naked body – she’d just lain there. And how could she let herself perform this most intimate of acts with the window as good as open, since their shutters hid nothing? Perhaps they had wanted the fresh evening breezes and were sure the street would be empty at this time of night. But why had she stayed there when she saw him? Perhaps she hadn’t seen him. No. She had definitely seen him; their eyes had met. Hisham was lost in confusion. He forgot all about economics; forgot the fluctuations of supply and demand and the balance between the producer and the consumer, when suddenly he was overcome by weariness. He got up from his bed and went up onto the roof where everyone was snoring deeply except for Hamad, whose bed was still empty.