Caught at Last, Caught at Last

You, pocket-size and folded, stowed yourself in the farthest corner of the restaurant surrounded by empty tables—away, away from everybody. The place faced the promenade and the sea, but your eyes would not abandon the tattered paperback in your hands, your head bent, your reading glasses almost falling off the flat tip of your nose. Hundreds of little Post-it notes bloomed from the book, from both sides of the pages. Your forearms pressed against the edge of the table. The paper napkins and faded silverware were still in the bread basket, no menu, no food yet. Mirrored walls encircled the restaurant’s interior, which made everything feel cold and airy, too fluorescent bright. A chemical apricot scent enveloped us.

A waiter, wearing black shoes polished to a shine, pointed to a table, but I walked over to say hello to you. Mazen and Rasheed followed. The waiter stood like a panther about to pounce, with a pugnacious look on his face. He regarded me as if I had crossed the gods of Olympus. And your face lifted, a reticent expression. You looked up at us as though we were something far off on a distant horizon, something you couldn’t discern. Our hovering at your table disturbed the light you read by. All I had to say was hello in our language, and like a good Lebanese boy, you jumped up to greet us respectfully, removing your reading glasses, your hand asking for a shake.

You were reading Hans Fallada’s Alone in Berlin—a little portentous, don’t you think? How many times had you read that one?

I announced myself—here I am—told you we’d met before, and you apologized for not remembering. I introduced Rasheed and my brother. There was a moment of awkward silence before you extended the requisite invitation to join you. You were stunned when I accepted, so shocked that Mazen nudged me with his elbow from one side and Rasheed from the other. I didn’t care that your invitation was insincere. I wasn’t going to let you get away from me, not again.

I have to tell you that you have the worst poker face, particularly when you’re feeling vulnerable. The look you gave me when I thanked you and pulled out a chair was priceless. Your eyes were about to roll out of their sockets and tumble along your pronounced nasolabial folds.

We sat down. You and the boys a mite awkward, unsure what to say. Luckily it wasn’t long before the waiter brought your order over, a feta dish heated in a clay skillet, swimming in herbs and olive oil. You had to share, of course. We waited for you to take the first taste and hand out judgment. It wasn’t bad, you said. It was wrong. And then you proceeded to make the bad chef pronouncement, at which point the mood at the table shifted, everyone relaxed and agreed wholeheartedly. It wasn’t terrible, Rasheed said, as he had a couple of bites out of the skillet. Why would you include oregano, Mazen said, as he sampled more of the dish. The ingredients were fresh, though, and you finished off everything. You wiped your lips with a piece of bread. We ordered another of the same dish.

You seemed to gain weight and confidence with each bite, asking Rasheed about his work in Jerusalem, about his volunteering in Lesbos. Mazen told self-deprecating jokes I’d heard a hundred times before about his ineptitude at selling stocks. At first, you skillfully evaded our questions about you. Mazen interrupted my third or fourth failed attempt to get you to talk about your work—he hadn’t read you—by asking about your being on Lesbos. You couldn’t stay away, you said. The images of the arriving boats seared themselves into your retinas and bored a hole in your heart. You told us that you’d worked on and off with Syrian refugees for years, all the interviews you’d done. There was an absurd number of refugees in Lebanon, you said, and more arriving every day, yet the country seemed to go on as if nothing was happening. Life in Beirut went on. You were not surprised, of course. You’d been through similar things before. During the civil war in Lebanon people trucked along. In San Francisco, the nicest and most compassionate humans were able to step over an unconscious homeless man if he blocked the sidewalk without even noticing what they were doing. You tried to find a way to write about refugees and break the wall between reader and subject. You said you wanted people not to dismiss the suffering, not to read about the loss and sorrow, feel bad for a minute or two, then go back to their glass of overly sweet chardonnay. But you failed, of course. And then the first crack in your veneer. You said, in a whisper, that the only wall you broke was yours. Your head bent forward again, shadowing your face and badly managed goatee, your chin coming to rest on the darker green collar of your sweater. A single long breath and you were back up again, alert eyes and a bittersweet smile.

Rasheed asked what you meant by having broken your wall.

“Nothing,” you said. “I was overwhelmed a little, that’s all. Don’t mind me. Everything grew to be a bit much, and luckily I’m not exactly needed right now, what with the storms and weather. I will be fine. Everything will work out.”

“Do you know what was too much for you?” Rasheed asked.

“Nothing really,” you said. Your eyes darted from one of us to the next in an incompetent attempt to assuage our concerns. “It was the wrong time for me to come here. That’s all, really.”

“Where are you staying?” Rasheed said.

Your smile flickered for a moment like a lightbulb in a socket with loose wiring.

“I don’t remember what it’s called,” you said. “It’s about ten minutes south of here, a cozy hotel close to the sea.”

“We’re on an island,” Rasheed said. “All hotels are close to the sea.”

“You were staying in our hotel,” I said. “I saw you leaving.”

“I ran away,” you said. “I had to find a hotel that was away from everything. But I’m doing better now. Okay, when I made my plans to come here, I thought I’d be able to help a little in this world that was falling apart. I never expected that I’d end up hiding in a hotel room. No, I didn’t. But I’m okay now.”

Later that evening, after our stint at the port, you’d correct your statement. Lesbos not only broke your wall, it broke you.