A Small Mistake

“What are you saying?” Isam shouted.

Nisrine was upset, nearly in tears.

“You promised me you’d take care of it yourself!” he said.

I entered the room. I didn’t understand what was going on. I looked at them openmouthed. Nisrine was defending herself, her hands waving in the air.

“It was a mistake. There was a mix-up with the papers.”

“Do you realize what you’ve done?”

Isam was clenching his teeth, hitting the table with his fist. The table shook and his hand nearly exploded. A wound on his hand. His ears turned very red. So that’s how he looks when he’s angry. I hadn’t imagined him capable of that.

“What is it?” I asked stupidly. “Why are you shouting?”

My tone was critical. Sympathetic toward Nisrine, biased toward her before I even knew what the mistake was. He looked at me with eyes that were too shiny. Tears?

Isam was crying over me.

I gasped. “What’s wrong with you?”

“Fatima, I’m sorry.”

“About what?”

“There’s been a mistake.”

My heart sank deep inside me. I readied my senses for the disaster.

“A mistake?”

“Your name is listed in the reading announcement.”

I swallowed. My legs felt weak and I sat on the edge of the chair, shaking. The end days had started and hell approached. I was done for. My blood filled with the feelings of the sacrificial victim before the knife. It was finally my turn. My mouth dry, my voice shaking, I asked, “How?”

“The papers got mixed up at the printers. They printed the old version.”

“What am I going to do now?”

“Don’t worry, Fatima.”

He sat on my right and held my hand, squeezing my fingers. My fingers melted in his warmth. I lifted my eyes to him, at a loss.

“We’ll take care of it,” he swore to me.

I whispered, stunned, “He’ll kill me.”

“You’re going to be okay.”

“My big brother!”

“He won’t find out about it.”

“Impossible!”

A few minutes later the rest of the group entered, with cheerful, tired faces, out of breath.

“Everything is fine, guys!”

“What did you do?”

“We took all the posters and announcements down from the walls. There’s no need to worry. Everything is under control.”

They smiled.

“Really?”

“Everything is fine.”

“You took down all the announcements?”

“Every last one! We tore them to shreds. We had a great time.”

“And how will people find out about the reading?”

“By SMS. Don’t worry.”

“No one’s going to come anyway.”

“No one pays any attention to us.”

With these guys everything turns into an entertaining story, something to laugh about. I looked at them disbelievingly. With as much gratitude as possible, I let out a deep breath and wiped my tears, looking at my friends, my love for them flowing from my eyes.

“Thank you.”

“There’s still one problem. One small problem.”

Isam understood. His eyes boring into mine, his face serious like never before. I looked at his face and saw love.

“What is it?”

“The newspaper announcement. In tomorrow’s edition, page sixteen. You’ll have to get rid of it yourself.”

“No problem.”

We smiled.

Everything was fine.

Or so we thought.