Late afternoon and Beirut airport is not as busy as she had expected it to be. She pushes the trolley through the sliding doors that lead into the arrivals lounge and, feeling momentary regret that there is no one there to meet her, makes her way to the taxi stand outside.
It is raining but the weather is not especially cold and her thick jacket feels suddenly oppressive. She motions to the driver of a large, black Mercedes parked right by the exit, gives him her suitcase to put in the boot and, getting into the back seat, takes off her coat. The air is musty and smells strongly of cigarette smoke, something she realizes she is no longer used to and which irritates her a little.
When the driver asks about her destination, she replies in flawless Arabic and smiles when she sees the surprised look on his face. I may look like a foreigner, she wants to tell him, but I know exactly where I am going and how much the fare should be and I’ve also been here often enough to know my way around. She says nothing, though. Her determination to fit in must begin here and now, but it is not strangers like this one that she is trying to convince.
She pulls the window down slightly and feels rain on her face as the driver speeds up and manoeuvres the car on to the highway. Moving her head from side to side to try and release the crick in her neck, she grimaces at the sight of the southern suburbs to her right, the tall, ungainly buildings, some still under construction, that crowd up against each other and deface the skyline and the once-clear views of the mountains to the east. To the left is the green and murky sea. It is clouded because of the stormy weather, but also because of the waste water that is allowed to flow relentlessly into it and which emits a foul smell into the air. She quickly shuts the window.
Moments later, she directs the driver to take the exit that leads to the coastal road into Ras Beirut, past the Raouche Rock and down on to the Corniche, scenic spots that she remembers well and which once appealed to her, past the enormous residential buildings and hotels that block light and sea views from the more modest structures that are situated behind them. Traffic is much heavier here, cars only reluctantly stopping at lights or, worse still, ignoring them altogether, horns blaring with impatience. She sighs and sits back in her seat.
This has always seemed to her a city of contrasts that somehow manage to complement each other, a city which, though not certain of its place in the world, continues to claim it anyway, in the hope perhaps that it will one day deserve the status it wants for itself.
The last time she had been here was just over three years ago, on a weekend visit with Anas that had stretched into several days because they could not bring themselves to leave, there was so much they longed to do. They had stayed with Peter and Hannah, spent their days wandering the streets of Ras Beirut at first and then going on impromptu trips to the mountains or down south as far as Bab Fatima on the border with Israel. They attended gallery openings, went to the theatre and ate the kind of food usually found in fancy restaurants in Europe. But even then, even as she experienced the privileges that Beirut offered, she had sensed the beginnings of its demise, noticed tell-tale signs that Beirut’s legendary charm was unravelling to reveal a city in anguish.
On their last night, they had sat with their hosts around a dining-room table that was weighted with food and drink and talked into the early hours with excitement about the uprisings in the region, of their implications, and with caution about the future, the potential obstacles that could arise in this seemingly unstoppable drive for justice and equality, for the end to dictatorship.
Anas, she recalls, had been the most optimistic of the four, had believed the Arab people would make the transition from revolution to nation-building successfully. But so many people are dying, she had protested. Surely there is an opportunity to do things differently here as well?
When she then voiced her misgivings that extremism might find in the upheaval in the Middle East an opportunity to take hold, Anas had dismissed her argument. That is the problem with thinking like a foreigner, he had said, gesturing with one hand so that she felt her heart sting. You cannot see beyond your age-old prejudices about the Arab world, about Islam and what you believe is our inferiority. It’s pure racism.
She had told herself at that moment that she would never give him occasion to make her feel that way again, though looking back now she realizes she had failed dismally at this also.
As absurd as she knows it to be, there is a part of her that believes that in dying the way he did, Anas had had the last word, had demonstrated, to her especially, how he had always been willing to make the ultimate sacrifice for what he believed in. We are, she thinks, often cruellest to those we love most.
When the taxi finally comes to a stop, the driver wheels her bag into the lobby of a suite hotel in the Hamra district that is only a few minutes’ walk from Hannah and Peter’s apartment and which, when she is on her own, is close enough to shops and restaurants and general activity to lose herself in should she need to.
Her room is spacious though a bit dim, has a tiny kitchenette at one end and a clean bathroom with, thankfully, a good-sized bath. She pulls open the window and looks out at the quiet street below, at the residential buildings opposite and the shops beneath them, closed at this time of night. She suddenly experiences an intense need for sleep, for temporary oblivion.
Turning back into her room again, she unpacks, undresses in the fading light and gets into bed. There is something thrilling about being alone like this. Until the moment I pick up that telephone, she tells herself, no one who matters knows where I am, what I am doing. She sees how easy it would be to simply disappear, to leave one life behind and start another without past burdens, the weight of what has happened before.
She dials for an outside line and makes the first call.
—Brigitte! The voice at the other end sounds surprised. Is that you?
—Hello, Peter, she says after a pause Yes, it’s me. I’ve finally made it to Beirut.