When Dr. Manahili dropped Zain off at the door, she staggered so badly that he didn’t have the heart to leave her. He decided he had to take her to her actual house, wherever it happened to be.
He drove to Mt. Qasioun, where he parked in the square and sat waiting in his car. She doesn’t seem to realize I didn’t believe her story about being the daughter of a dancer at the Siryana Club. The girl’s a lousy liar, but she certainly is brave. She’s the only person who’s ever come for an abortion all by herself, and I know she can’t possibly be her stated age of twenty-four. I’ve been around too long to fall for a claim like that. All the others have come with a husband, a sister, a mother or a girlfriend—in other words, with some sort of moral support. When she came to make the appointment, she was plastered with makeup to convince me she was the daughter of this imaginary nightclub dancer, but I was skeptical. Granted, some nightclub dancers care more about educating their kids than some high-society ladies. But that girl’s no skid row kid. For one thing, the diamond bracelet she tried to pay me with is worth a lot of money. It’s obvious that she comes from an aristocratic family and that the bracelet is an heirloom— unless she stole it, of course. Besides, nightclub dancers and their daughters know the value of the money they work so hard for, and there’s no way they’d give up a diamond bracelet to pay a doctor like me. In any case, I’m charmed by her innocent gaffs, and I don’t blame her for thinking she could buy me with a diamond bracelet, since I’ve got a pretty bad reputation around here. The fact is, sometimes I agree to perform illegal abortions for the sake of the unborn children. I’m not worried about the money. It’s my wife who worries about that, since she’s got her heart set on us settling in Paris and opening a clinic there. I don’t want to see any child be born into a broken home and suffer the way I did. Zain probably suffered a lot herself from her paternal aunts in the big house in Ziqaq Al Yasmin, where I used to play with her dad when we were little boys. This is assuming, of course, that the mystery girl really is Zain Khayyal. When my wife heard her raving under the effect of the anesthesia, she jumped at the chance to ask her what her name was. She didn’t exactly admit to being Zain Khayyal. She said a name I’m not sure I understood right, but that’s what I think I heard. She was muttering so incoherently most of the time, she might have been saying something else.
My wife asked her the question in French and she answered in Arabic, “My name’s Zain… Zain Khayyal.” At least that’s what I think she said. Despite her valiant attempts to learn Arabic, my wife still doesn’t understand it very well, and she asked me what the girl was saying. “Oh, nothing,” I told her. “She’s talking nonsense.” When a woman is lying terrified on an operating table with a gas mask on her face and a needle in her vein, she has no idea what sorts of secrets she’s giving away. When I hear the things patients say, I begin to hate some and sympathize with others. This girl’s one of the ones I sympathize with. She was doing her best to keep her subconscious under control, but nobody can hold out against drugs like these. The prick of a needle in the right place and a few drops of the right drug, and the doors of the mind fly open like a bank’s vault at the touch of a seasoned burglar.
He thought back on the various scenes subsequent to her arrival at his clinic. With every step she took and every muffled groan she released, she seemed to stalk his very thoughts. He remembered supporting her on his arm as she got into his car and asking her where she wanted him to take her. “To Subki Park,” she’d replied mechanically. “To the house across from the park entrance.” Hoping to catch her off guard, he’d asked, “Which entrance?” “The main entrance,” came her curt reply. He could tell she was lying. He knew her father’s house—if she was Zain Khayyal—was on Abu Rummana Street in the Sahat Al Midfaa neighborhood. So he figured she must be directing him to where she lived with her husband. No, maybe she’s still not telling the truth. But as bad as it is, I love the way she lies.
Zain had pointed to a two-storey building across from one of the entrances to Subki Park. On the main door he had seen a sign that read, “Building for Sale.”
“Here,” she had announced abruptly with a wince. She seemed to have difficulty even lifting her arm to point to the place.
As Dr. Manahili got out of his car at Sahat Al Muhajirin, he was haunted by the memory of Zain’s muted dignity and her amateurish fibs.
He paced up and down the square, trying in vain to get her out of his tortured thoughts. I knew that wasn’t her house. She’s the worst liar I’ve ever met, which makes me feel even closer to her. Or maybe what draws me to her is her guts. I didn’t mention anything about this to my wife, and I’ve hardly been able to admit it even to myself. But in spite of all the problems here, I don’t want to move to Paris. I want to stay in Damascus. When I let her out of my car, I was so worried about her I couldn’t get myself to leave. So I drove to the end of the street that runs alongside Subki Park and pulled over for a while, not sure what to do. She’s the type that doesn’t like other people butting into her affairs. That was obvious even when she was still partly under the anesthesia.
If, as I’m inclined to believe, she really is Zain Khayyal, then we’re bonded by the fact that we’re both orphans. We orphans know by telepathy who loves us and who doesn’t. We’ve learned from bitter experience how to read people’s intentions toward us. We’ve also learned to support each other in secret, and openly too sometimes. So when she claimed to be the daughter of a nightclub dancer, I pretended to believe her. I kept telling myself that some nightclub dancers are more cultured and warm-hearted than some high-society ladies. I ought to know! Sometimes a celebrity will come to me because she suspects she might be pregnant by her dark-skinned lover and is afraid her blonde, blue-eyed husband might notice that his child is half black. One woman, after getting pregnant by a black waiter, came to me saying something ridiculous about getting pregnant while she was taking a bath because the maid hadn’t cleaned the tub well enough!
My hunch had been right. In my rear-view mirror I saw her leaving the building where I’d dropped her off. She’d hidden in its stairwell, as I’d suspected she would, and had come out thinking I was gone. She crossed the street and walked wobbly-legged into Subki Park. I didn’t spy on her after that. I knew she would collapse onto a park bench to soak up some sunshine and recoup her strength, then probably head somewhere else, though she hadn’t decided where yet. I drove toward Sahat Al Muhajirin, a haven for Damascenes when their lives are in turmoil. When they’re having a hard time, they tend to retreat into silence until they explode. About to explode myself by this time, I was tempted to follow her to Subki Park. I wanted to tell her, “I was careful to perform your abortion in such a way that you’ll be able to have children in the future. Your courage is an inspiration to me, a cowardly orphan who was hurt as a child but never had the guts to speak up to his father.”
Dr. Manahili paced up and down Sahat Al Muhajirin, looking out periodically at the orchards that stretched out below him. This girl, who might be the Zain I know, has brought up sadness from my past. But what she did was a good thing. She had the pluck to abort a baby that would have ended up like me as a little boy, shuttling back and forth between two broken homes, subjected to insults, hatred, and even physical abuse. My stepmother seemed to take delight in me getting sick, since this gave her the chance to torture me on the pretext of taking care of me. And her remedy of choice: an enema! My father didn’t object to her prescription. In fact, he used to thank her for taking care of me and would go off to work with his mind at rest. Torture by enema on the pretext of “treating” a child was common in those days. Raising the instrument of torture by a single centimeter would be enough to send waves of excruciating pain around the anus’s tender periphery. So when she elevated the enema bag, the soap and water mixture would flow more forcefully into my innards, and I’d feel as though my gut was about to explode. But I wouldn’t let myself cry. Then she’d raise it a little higher, hoping I’d cry out in pain and beg her to stop. My insides were being torn apart, but instead of crying, I’d just flash her a defiant stare. When I’m in a lot of pain, I generally just scream and let it out. But I was determined not to give her what she wanted. Instead of begging and pleading, I looked at her with cold loathing. I knew better than to expect compassion from my tormenter, and I could sense with a child’s subtle intuition that if I begged for mercy, she’d just want to hurt me even more. Sadists aren’t out to kill their victims, since if they did that, they’d rob themselves of the pleasure of continuing to watch them suffer.
I feel sure this girl must have been subjected to something similar—if not physical torment, then the psychological variety.
As he paced his concrete platform overlooking the city, Dr. Manahili wished he could take Zain to the rustic cafe near Qubbat Al Sayyar. Of course, she wouldn’t be able to climb the dirt staircase that leads up to the highest section of the cafe. But she could have a cup of coffee at a table near the entrance. Wait - I wouldn’t let her have even a cup of coffee now. She’d have to settle for some chamomile tea, mint tea, or… Oh, right, I forgot to tell her about that. But I did remember to write her a prescription… What’s happening to me? Am I falling in love with this girl when I’m old enough to be her father? Or am I just taken by the fact that she had the courage to get an abortion all on her own despite her young age, the way I’ve always wished my mother had done? Isn’t it true that I married my wife because I knew she was barren? Of course, she isn’t barren exactly. She needs surgery on her fallopian tubes, and if she had the operation, she’d be able to have children. But out of selfishness I’ve never told her so. I’m no saint, that’s for sure.
When my wife wasn’t looking, I put the diamond bracelet back on the girl’s wrist while she was recovering from the operation. I was impressed by the fact that even when she was delirious from the anesthesia, she didn’t say a word about her partner, as if she were determined to take sole responsibility for the abortion.
After downing a cup of black coffee, Dr. Manahili went back to Sahat Al Muhajirin, parked his car, and walked down Al Qasr Al Jumhuri Street along the railroad track, to his right the Presidential Palace and the Al Idlibi Family villa. He passed through Sheikh Muhyi Al Din, Al Jisr Al Abyad, Arnous, and Shaalana on his way to Subki Park. I confess, I’m worried about her. I want to make sure she’s all right. Where has she gone now? To her husband’s house? To her father’s house? And where would either of them be?
Dr. Manahili decided to pay Zain’s father a visit the following day. That way he could confirm whether she really was Zain Khayyal whose wedding he’d been invited to. No… I’m not in love with her. But she’s the daughter I would have hoped to have, and I’m going to support her. Or rather, she’s the daughter I didn’t want to have, but that I admire with all my heart! I love her. Yes, I love her the way I would have loved the daughter I was fortunate enough not to have. She’s got plenty of faults, foremost among which is her weakness for trying to lie her way through hard situations and doing an incredibly bad job of it. At the same time, she’s brave and defiant. She makes her own decisions and acts on them.
I suppose I’m a liar too, but after so many years of practice, I’ve mastered the art of prevarication. Zain—if that’s who she is—will never know I love her, and neither will anybody else. Love her? There goes the artist inside me babbling away like a lunatic… How could I be in love with somebody whose name I’m not even sure about? I’m just a crazy old man who needs to learn to keep his feelings in check! How could I be in love with a girl who’s young enough to be my daughter? That’s ridiculous… But whoever said love was rational? On the contrary, it’s the irrational par excellence, or so it appears to be at this moment. My feelings for her are so confused. She’s stirred up all the pain in my heart, and suddenly I’m remembering whole strings of events I thought I’d forgotten all about. It’s as if she’s aborted my ability to keep bad memories at bay.
He walked back to his car and drove to the Arnous neighborhood where he and his wife lived. He was afraid she might see him as she left their house on her way to the French Cultural Center and the elementary schools where she volunteered as a French teacher. The last thing he would have wanted to do was hurt her feelings. A goodhearted woman, she had agreed to come with him to a country she knew nothing about, and had worked hard to adapt to life without knowing anything about the tormenting thoughts that haunted him. Yet despite his worry that she might spot him, he hung around Subki Park to see what Zain—or whatever her name was—had done with herself.
My father, a government employee who was always getting razzed by his subordinates, used to beat me. I was his scapegoat, and he would take all his bitterness and frustrations from work out on my little body. As his switch seared my back he would hiss, “Why didn’t you die? Your mother did everything she could to abort you. And now you’re tormenting your poor ‘Auntie’!” I was determined to survive despite all my disappointments, but when I went to my stepmother for comfort, all I got was a cold, disapproving stare. Meanwhile, she pampered her own little boy, the one she’d conceived with her new husband. After working for a while at a grocery store, I got a job working for a blacksmith who sharpened people’s knives for them. Meanwhile I was sharpening my own knives, studying at night on the sly for my middle school certificate. Then I worked as an elementary teacher and managed to finish high school. When I was a teenager, my father avoided me. He wouldn’t even look me in the eye. In fact, he was so intent on dodging me that he wouldn’t go to the kitchen until he’d heard me turn on the light in the bathroom. Not realizing I was studying, he used to make fun of my interest in books, and he resented having to pay the bill for the electricity I used up by reading at night. So when he asked me what I was reading, I’d tell him I was reading the Qur’an, since nobody would dare scold his son for reading the book of God.
When my father found out I was in medical school, he was so furious that he told me to quit my stupid studying and do something I could make a living from. I told him I wanted to be a doctor. “What!” he scoffed. “A beast like you become a doctor?” “That’s right,” I told him. “Like other beasts, I’m struggling to survive.”
Changing the subject, he groused, “You’re living here rent-free, by the way.” A classmate of mine had told me about a room for rent in an elderly widow’s house, and the next day I moved out. I didn’t say a word. I just disappeared from their lives, which was exactly what they wanted me to do. After I graduated I found out they’d been looking for me. And why? Because my father wanted to rake me over the coals for leaving, and my stepmother wanted to tell me how grateful I should be to her for wearing herself raising me! She was good at making up stories about how she’d taken care of me when I was little, when she was the one who’d made me sick in the first place.
Have I forgiven them? I don’t know. Forgiveness is an elusive sort of thing. Sometimes, when you’re feeling serene, you stitch up old wounds; then along come the shadows of bitterness and resentment and tear the stitches out. In any case, I went to France on a scholarship to study obstetrics and gynecology. My aim: to be able to abort any woman who was carrying a child nobody wanted. A child that would come into the world only to be abused and degraded, then grow up without being able either to forgive or forget.
When I met the French nurse who later became my wife, I didn’t tell her about any of this. The look of admiration in her eyes came as a thrill to this hardworking man who had felt so degraded and defeated. Here was somebody who, as she handed me the scalpel, looked at my hands with respect and appreciation. I was a sucker for her veneration, and when I came back to Damascus after graduating, she came with me.
Once you’ve tasted the water of Al Fijeh Spring, you’ll be nostalgic for Damascus as long as you live. Ah, the memories of wandering through Bab Al Jabiyah, Bab Tuma, Al Salihiyah, Al Jisr Al Abyad, Sheikh Muhyi Al Din Mosque, Al Qassaa, the Umayyad Mosque, Souq Al Hamidiya, Al Marjah, Baghdad Street, Qanawat, Al Shaghour, Mi’dhanat Al Shahm, Qabratkeh, and on and on… They won’t let you forget them. I came back to Damascus not to take revenge on the people who had humiliated me and who need me now. I came back because my love for Damascus won’t let me go.
The city changed a lot while I was gone, as had everyone I’d known there. This kind of change goes on all the time, of course, and cities mirror the spirits of those who live in them. When I got back, everybody seemed to think I’d forgotten the abuse I’d endured during my childhood and adolescence, and when they came to the clinic for treatment, they’d make up funny stories about things I was supposed to have experienced with them when I was a little boy. All I could remember was maltreatment and humiliation. Somehow I managed to keep my mouth shut with a stupid, Mona Lisa-esque smile plastered on my face.
Maybe I get my calm resignation from drawing pictures of the children I’ve aborted. Before doing a drawing, I form an image in my head based on what I know of the parents’ features, my impressions of their personalities, and the kinds of suffering that might have been in store for the child. I have a huge collection of drawings that people might think are of babies I delivered. Little do they know they’re of children I euthanized. As for people who know what I actually do, they assume I do it for money, and I let them think whatever they please.
Tonight I’ll go home to my wife, who doesn’t know a thing about what goes on deep inside me, and plant a kiss on her forehead. Then I’ll head for my clinic, which at night I turn into a studio, and draw Zain’s baby. He’ll be beautiful and mournful like his mother, who has no idea what sorrows she’s stirred up in my soul. This is the first time a girl has come to get an abortion without support from anyone at all, and it’s shaken me to the core. I go looking for her in Subki Park, but I don’t see her. I wonder where she went.
The building Zain had asked Dr. Manahili to take her to had once been home to her friend Nayela. The two of them had attended twelfth grade together in Al Jisr Al Abyad neighborhood, and Zain had passed by Nayela’s every day so that they could walk to school together. Nayela didn’t live there anymore, and the building had been put up for sale. Even so, Zain plopped down on its front steps to rest for a while until the doctor was out of sight. She doused her neck with jasmine perfume from a Parisian crystal bottle she’d inherited from her mother. Jasmine perfume made her feel stronger, as if it were the scent of her ancestors’ spirits.
The abortion was just the beginning. The worst part is still to come. My husband’s been getting ready to celebrate my eighteenth birthday in full bourgeois style. But tonight I’ve got to tell him that it’s all over between us.
Zain got up and left the building. She was afraid some resident might come out, find her sitting on the stairs and ask her what she wanted. She was too worn out to come up with a story about why she was there. Feeling more exhausted than ever, she decided to rest for a while on the bench nearest the Subki Park entranceway. She could hardly walk, but she had to decide what to do next. Now that she was homeless, whose house would she go to – her husband’s, or her father’s? And how would she get there? Would she have the strength to tell her husband what she’d decided to do that very day, or would she put it off until the next morning? Was that Dr. Manahili’s car parked at the end of the street, or did it just look like his? As she collapsed onto a green bench, she regretted not having bought her scarf to wrap around her neck. Damascus’s autumn sun was warm. It was hot, in fact. Even so, she was shivering. She felt panicky. She might start bleeding, and catch a cold, too.
I’m a boulder on Mt Qasioun.
Afraid one of her aunts might pass by and see her, she moved to a bench further from the entrance. On one bench lay a homeless man taking a nap. Then she spotted an empty bench across from a turbaned man with a rosary in his hand. When he saw Zain, his fingers started fiddling more rapidly with his beads as though she were an evil omen. Undeterred, she flung herself down on the bench opposite him, closed her eyes, and fell into a coma-like slumber.
She was wakened by the sound of children who had come to the park with their mother and were taking turns screeching. She was too tired to move to another bench, but she planned to pass by the Kaddoura Pharmacy to buy the medications the doctor had prescribed. She hadn’t understood part of his instructions, so she’d decided to read the prescription later when she felt calmer and to ask the pharmacist about what she’d missed.
As she sat there engrossed in her anxious thoughts, in pain and on the verge of despair, she heard a voice speaking to her. It was vivacious and manly.
“Would you mind if I sat down here?” the voice asked. “All the other benches are occupied, as you can see.”
“Go ahead,” Zain replied curtly without a sideward glance. As she spoke, she picked up her purse and shrank toward one end of the bench. Meanwhile, she continued to wonder how she was going to get home when she could hardly walk, and whether she would go to the house she’d been sharing with her husband in Hayy Al Ra’is, or to her father’s house in Sahat Al Midfaa. It was a reminder that she didn’t have a house she could really call her own. At the same time, she couldn’t bring herself to go to a hotel.
I wish I had a cave in the wilderness just for me, some place where I could argue with myself, and with the woman who lives inside me and who’s started using my fingers to express her ideas.
She felt a terrible urge to go to the old house in Ziqaq Al Yasmin. If she just told her family what she’d done, maybe they’d take her in and give her the TLC she needed so badly. Then she realized what a ridiculous thought this was. In your dreams, girl! Who do you think you’re fooling?
The stranger sharing the bench with her said, “I’m Ghazwan Ayed. What’s your name?”
Looking over at him for the first time, she saw a slightly built young man of medium height whose face was adorned by a mop of thick hair, a pair of eyes that dripped with honey, and an exquisitely dimpled chin. She wondered if his mother had pressed a chickpea into it when he was little to make that lovely indentation. According to her grandmother, at least, this was how people got dimples in their chins. For a few moments Zain forgot all about her pain and the awful day she was having. At the same time, she drew her blouse more snugly around her as though to protect herself from an invasion. The stranger took off his suit jacket and, without asking her permission, draped it over her shoulders and tucked it fondly around her neck.
“There,” he said simply. “You’re so beautiful! But you’re so pale and tired-looking. And you’re shivering with cold even though it’s warm!”
She said nothing, but made no attempt to resist his gesture. She really had begun to shiver despite the warmth in the air. She felt herself slipping out of consciousness again. In a voice she felt she’d known for a thousand years, he said, “I’m Ghazwan Ayed. I’m telling you my name again because I don’t want you to forget it. And I want you to know that as drained as you are, I find you ravishingly beautiful without a drop of makeup. Are you a Palestinian refugee like me?”
Amazed by the steadiness in her voice, as though she were drawing strength from his presence, she replied tranquilly, “I’m a local refugee from no place and no time. I could tell you were Palestinian from your accent. I have a cousin who’s a Palestinian refugee too. You’re welcome here.”
“Don’t worry,” he added amiably, “I won’t be invading your house, or even your neighborhood! My family has a house here and I’ve got a job as a teacher in Kuwait. But I’m on leave now, since I’m also a student at the University of Damascus.”
She cracked a smile for the first time since her miserable day had begun. She wanted to tell him that she was a university student too, and that they might even have a class together, but she couldn’t get anything to come out of her mouth. Her nerves were a wreck, and she kept fading alternately in and out of consciousness.
“You’re not much of a talker,” he commented. “But your eyes speak for you. I can hear them. They’ve got a music about them, and they fill the sky with a rainbow of light.”
Then he went quiet.
They sat pondering the colorful autumn leaves as they fell from the trees. Zain seemed to recall hearing of Ghazwan Ayed before. She’d read some short stories in newspapers by someone with that name. She felt as though they’d lived some previous life together. Come on now. Don’t go off on some romantic tangent. You’ve seen his picture in a magazine on literary criticism. No, it wasn’t him. Yes, it was. Those eyes… that dimple. That handsome face… Chill out, advised the sensible writer who lived inside her. The anesthesia hasn’t worn off, and you’re still not rational.
Ghazwan looked her straight in the eye for a long time. Then suddenly, and with utter seriousness, he said, “Will you marry me? If you’ve turned eighteen, how about we do the ceremony today?” Zain burst out laughing. “But you haven’t even asked me what my name is!” she said, “Or whether I’m married or not. Or pregnant, for example!” Does every day bring a new love?1 she whispered to herself. His presence almost made her forget her pain and the tangled web she was struggling to break loose from.
“Well, girl, whatever your name is, I love you!”
So there it was: an outpouring of madness, Palestinian-style! And what a beautiful madman he was. She knew she’d never forget him. How could she forget a handsome young man who’d asked for her hand in marriage the very first time he saw her? But she wasn’t going to get carried away by romantic fancies or “love at first sight.” She’d tried that before, and now she was suffering the consequences.
If it hadn’t been for a sudden stab of pain in her abdomen, she would have sprouted wings and flown away right there and then. The wave of pain and fatigue pulled her into the depths and nearly drowned her. She didn’t really know whether she had seen that face in The Critic magazine or not, or even whether she’d heard the name before. Her mind was a total blur. She was so exhausted, all she wanted to do was close her eyes and sleep. She needed to lie down on a bed that wasn’t an operating table, and without a doctor in a white lab coat standing over her.
“I’ve got to be going,” she said to Ghazwan.
“What?” he said. “Are you leaving? Do you think you can run away from me or forget me? I love you, and that’s that!”
Ghazwan had swept her off her feet, but her body wasn’t up to the adventure. She felt about as energetic as a limp rag. In a tremulous voice that she could hardly bear to hear coming out of her mouth, she replied, “I’m going to the pharmacy to buy some medicine.” What she didn’t say out loud was: Then I’m going to my husband’s house behind the pharmacy to sleep!
The writer living inside her, whose voice was getting louder by the day, said: Spend one more night in your husband’s house. You need rest before making the final leap. Besides, going to my dad’s house would mean having to explain myself, and I’m too spent for that now. Okay then, one last night with my husband, and tomorrow morning I’ll tell him goodbye.
In a tone as serious as it was playful, Ghazwan asked her, “Now that I’ve proposed, might you do me the honor of telling me your name, Miss mystery Girl?”
Her only reply was, “I’ve got a cold and have to be going…” “I’ll take you wherever you need to go. I’ve got my friend’s car till ten o’clock tonight.”
“To Kaddoura Pharmacy, please,” she said. “I need to buy a bottle of aspirin, then go home.”
“Very well, Subki Park girl!” he agreed.
“Let’s go, then,” she said. Ghazwan was enthused, thinking he’d find out where she lived. He didn’t want to lose track of her. Something drew him to her, though he wasn’t sure what it was.
When she gave his coat back to him, he nearly told her to keep it, but then he thought better of it, since it was the only one he had. He never wanted her to go away. It surprised him to feel this way, since he usually took to women who were fans of his, who had read his stories and who knew him as a writer. This girl doesn’t seem to care about anything, as if she were living on some other planet. On the other hand, I think she really is sick. She must have a cold, or something worse. Zain wanted to tell him she was married, that she’d had an abortion just hours before, and that this was why she was feeling so awful. But she couldn’t get herself to say it. He drove off with her, wishing she could stay by his side forever in a car that would never stop, break down or blow up! Unfortunately, though, they reached their destination.
He pulled up in front of the pharmacy. Zain got out with a painful slowness that was inconsistent with her youth, giving him all the more reason to believe she was genuinely ill. She reached out and shook his hand. He took her hand in his, saying: “I’ll wait for you.” As he held her hand, he realized how a handshake can be the equivalent of a warm embrace. He didn’t know what madness had come over him, but whatever it was, he wanted more than anything else in the world never to part with her.
At last she withdrew her hand from his with a smile and fibbed, “I’ll be back after I buy the aspirin.” For some reason he didn’t believe her. Even so, he still expected to see her when she came out of the pharmacy. Little did he know that the pharmacy had a back door that opened onto the alley off the street she lived on. So after buying the medicine, she escaped to her house through the back entrance. Meanwhile, he went on waiting in his stopped car while a traffic policeman took his license plate number.
Once in the house, Zain fell exhausted onto the bed. It had been a long, long day. To her relief, her husband wasn’t home. She drew the curtains and lay back down. In the dim light she saw a naked infant floating through the air. She felt the pain of the millions of people all over the planet who are miserable for one reason or another. She saw scissors, scalpels, tiny probes and terrifying needles floating all over the room alongside the baby. They went flying around in front of her face, in her eyes, inside her head. She took her head in her hands. She wanted to scream, but stifled herself, afraid that her husband might come home and see what was wrong. The minute she thought about him, everything vanished. She went out onto the balcony and tried to breathe, but the pathway between her lungs and her throat felt blocked, like a mountain road covered with rocks and dirt from a sudden landslide. She was tempted to take refuge in the sleeping pill the doctor had given her as she got out of his car. He said, “You might need this tonight.” What a thoughtful person he is. He’s nothing at all like the rumors going around about him.
She pictured Ghazwan’s refreshing face as he said to her on the way to the pharmacy, “You’ve got your whole life ahead of you. The future is yours. Don’t crawl into your shell. Poke a hole in it the way a butterfly does with its cocoon, and come fly with me. I love you. I love you!”
Zain swallowed the magic pill. Then she sank into a coma-like slumber. Some time later she was wakened by her husband’s voice. “Get up, lazy bones! We’re going to celebrate your birthday tonight. Have you forgotten? And why did you run off in the early morning before I got a chance to see you?”
She didn’t reply. It’s as if I’m at the bottom of the sea, and voices come and go like waves along some deserted shore.
“How can you sleep now?” he asked, his voice fading in and out. “I reserved your favorite table for dinner on Candles’ second-floor balcony. We’re going to celebrate your eighteenth birthday in style! And here’s your present: a diamond necklace.” “I’ve got the flu,” she said in a whisper. “I took some medicine for it, and it’s the kind that makes you sleepy.”
His tone suddenly sharp, he demanded, “So where were you all day, anyway? I didn’t find you at the university, or at the library either!”
“I was at the doctor,” she replied listlessly. “I’ve got the stomach flu, so it’s better not to get too close to me. You go have a good time with friends or family, and we’ll talk in the morning. I’m all doped up now. I feel like I’m at the bottom of a well.”
Hoping to avoid sharing a bed with her husband that night, she decided to tell him she’d sleep in the library because she didn’t want to give him the flu. The library gave her a cozy feeling. She would shut herself up alone there, let out her frustrations by dancing to the wild strains of Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite, and study the rest of the time. But she was too weak to carry through with her plan.
After giving up on getting her to cuddle, he drifted off to sleep. She could hear his snoring. Amazed to be alive, Zain struggled to keep the day’s grueling events from replaying themselves in her brain, but they kept running across her inner screen like a bad movie while she faded in and out of consciousness. Even so, she was grateful to be lying in a bed instead of being laid out in a death shroud.
The fog in her head was suddenly penetrated by the image of Ghazwan in Subki Park. I’ve always dreamed of going to Hyde Park in London, Central Park in New York City, the Flower Clock in Geneva, and on and on. It never occurred to me that out of all these places, the one that would be branded into my heart would be good old Subki Park. And why? Because that’s where I first met Ghazwan. I was in a sorry state, like an owl with a broken wing, but he was so good to me. If my mother, the closet litterateur I’ve never had the pleasure of knowing, had seen me, she would have understood, and she would have bent down to mend my wing. Grandma Hayat always says I’m “just a little bit of a girl – a half-pint.” But I carry around the sorrows of a middle-aged woman.
So what’s going on with me? The minute I come out of one relationship, I’m in danger of getting mixed up in another. Like somebody swinging over an alligator- and snake-infested swamp, I let go of one rope and grab onto another one. Does every day bring a first love? Is Ghazwan’s love dangerous? The danger is to my mental health. How could I let him slip into my life when it’s in such a mess?
I think of the doctor’s kind-hearted French wife, who had no idea what she was getting herself into when she came here. I’ll bet people blame her for every mistake anybody makes. After all, not only is she a woman—she’s a foreigner. So people accuse her of getting Dr. Manahili into the work he does. I’m thinking about her because I’m pretty sure I’ll meet the same fate she has. I’ll be stigmatized as an “insubordinate” woman, and my husband, who hasn’t been able to break into my mind and spirit, is sure to use that against me. But I’m a boulder on Mt. Qasioun.
* * *
When Zain woke up the next morning, she ran her hands over her body one part at a time, like a teacher taking attendance. To her amazement, she wasn’t in any pain at all. On the contrary, she felt energized, and her bleeding had stopped. She voiced a silent thank you to Dr. Manahili, who appeared to have taken top-notch care of her. When she got up to wash her face, she discovered that her diamond bracelet was back on her wrist. She was sure she’d given it to the doctor’s wife. So what had happened? And why hadn’t she noticed it on her arm until now? Was I that out of it from the anesthesia?
She was more determined than ever to get out of her marriage. She needed to end this chapter of her life, turn the page, and start at the beginning of a new line. It was terrifying to be faced with the unknown. She got out of her marriage bed for the last time while her husband was still asleep and slyly drank her coffee. In a small bag she placed the secret notebooks that held her stories and poems, and in another she packed her school books.
Ever since my husband started sweet-talking me ten days ago about what we were going to do on my eighteenth birthday, I’ve felt like telling him – and specifically on my birthday – that I don’t want to live with him anymore, and that it’s all over between us. I don’t want to go on and on about it or have to justify it either to him or to myself. No stinging reproach, no bargaining, no calculating profits and losses. We’re through, and that’s that. There are so many painful details to deal with, we could go on fighting for hours.
But I haven’t said a thing to him. I haven’t told him I was pregnant either, even though I’d known it for more than two weeks when I had the abortion. I suddenly realized I couldn’t say anything to anybody, not even to my dear father, my nurturing grandmother, or my girlfriends. I was going to have to make my own decision and bear the consequences without any external support. The only thing I could rely on was what my dad used to call the second engine. I had to grow up, and I did.
Her books and papers were all she planned to rescue from the sinking ship. She’d leave her clothes and jewelry behind. Her university textbooks were especially dear to her heart. Every one of them represented some moment of indecision or transition, such as the moment when she’d fallen in love with an author’s creativity, or with an idea. Each one contained her hand-written impressions, and the Arabic meanings of words that had still been unclear to her even after she’d looked them up. She’d really communed with the things she’d read and studied.
Zain got dressed, but she didn’t spruce herself up or even get her makeup bag out the way she usually did.
She wasn’t sure what to do next, though. Should she wake her husband up to tell him she wouldn’t be coming back? Should she wait until he woke up on his own? Or should she leave without saying anything at all, and to hell with the Damascene good manners she’d been raised on? Remembering a notebook she’d hidden under her side of the mattress, she sneaked in to get it, and decided to leave right away without saying anything to her husband. She knew he might call her or follow her to work to spy on her. If he did, she would tell him from there that they were through: no blame, no regrets, no heated exchanges. When everything is over between two people, it’s best to stop talking altogether.
She was tempted to take her pen cemetery with her. She never had the heart to throw pens away when they went dry, and her defunct pen collection was the final resting place for her dearest friends. But she didn’t think she’d have room for it in her bag.
Like a wary owl, she slipped quietly into the bedroom to extricate the notebook. The mattress was heavier than usual. Or maybe I’m still just worn out from what I went through yesterday. I haven’t got time to be thinking about that, though. I must face today, which could get stormy when I tell him I want a separation— or rather, that we need to recognize the separation that started the moment we were married.
No sooner had Zain drawn her notebook out from under the mattress than her husband got up and turned on the light switch. He peered at her groggily. “What time is it?” he asked with a yawn. “And where are you going if you’re sick?”
With a cool, calm voice that she hardly recognized as her own, and which had merged with the voice of the rebellious author inside her, she announced, “I’m going to work, and I won’t be coming back here this evening. It’s all over between us, and I want a divorce.”
She fled from the room before he could start shouting and cursing. She picked up her suitcase, repeating to herself over and over, “I’m a boulder on Mt. Qasioun. I’m not afraid. No, I’m not afraid. I’ll speak my mind, and nobody is going to scare me from now on. I’m a boulder on Mt. Qasioun. A boulder doesn’t tremble, and it doesn’t cry.” Her husband beat her to the front door and shouted, “All right. If you don’t want to come back, so be it. But you’ll have to wait until I get dressed so I can go turn you over to your father!” Then he locked the door with the key. She didn’t try unlocking it with her own key for fear that he might get violent. He was a lot bigger and stronger than she was.
She sat waiting in the entranceway, pretending she didn’t hear her husband pacing nervously back and forth and ranting and raving to himself as he put his clothes on. They got in the car and he drove like a maniac, as though he wanted to run over everybody he passed. She didn’t reply to a thing he said on the way.
They walked up the steps to her father’s law office. Her husband went in without her, and she heard him say, “I’ve come to turn your daughter over to you.” The words “turn… over to you” exploded in her head So he’s “turning me over” like some spoiled merchandise he wants to return to the seller!
“So,” Amjad Khayyal retorted, “you’re bringing her back to me a squeezed lemon!” The phrase “squeezed lemon” also went off like a bomb in her head. A squeezed lemon? Right. Well, I’ve lost a lot of weight and I had an abortion yesterday. But I’m a human being, not a lemon that somebody squeezes and throws away. One of them wants to turn me over like a piece of merchandise, and the other one’s decided the merchandise isn’t usable anymore.
She felt so degraded and furious, she couldn’t say a word. Whenever the voice of the rebel inside her got louder and louder, she went silent: wounded, insulted, humiliated. The voice deep down, which she knew was her own, said, Don’t start to cry now. This won’t last. You won’t let it. You’re going to stand up to him. Remember: You’re a boulder on Mt. Qasioun.
She sat down on a bench next to the exit. I hate arguments. And I hate violence disguised as polite clichés. That’s why the people I reject are so taken off guard. I do it without warning, and with a composure as cool as a cucumber. I kill them in my heart with a silent, bloodless elegance. My husband is dead to me now, and all that remains is to list his name in my heart’s obituary column. We never got into any arguments, since I discovered that trying to discuss things with him was a lost cause. I tried at first to draw him into conversations, but it never worked. I told myself it had been a good learning experience and all the usual things people say to make themselves feel better when they’re let down. But something inside me had broken. I still feel insulted and defeated, but I’m holding myself together. So if this is what love does to people, then it isn’t for me! This is the last time I’ll let myself be ground into the dirt.
Leaving her father and her husband to bicker over the squeezed lemon, Zain left and went to her father’s house in Sahat Al Midfaa, where she could see Grandma Hayat, the only person who’d ever really welcomed her with open arms.
Seeing Zain in the doorway with a suitcase in her hand, her grandmother knew something big was afoot.
“I’ve left him,” Zain announced. “We’re through. I want a divorce.”
“You’re always welcome here, honey. Besides, nobody ever liked Waseem. You weren’t right for each other. Your dad knew it from the start, but because he loved you so much, he went along with what you wanted.”
“Well, it’s over, Grandma. I’ll tell you what happened to me…”
“Don’t you tell me a thing,” her grandmother interrupted. “I might open my big mouth and blabber to somebody about it! You shouldn’t trust anybody with your secrets, not even me. The only person we should complain to is God. Like they say, ‘Better a heartbreak in the kitchen than a scandal around the block.’”
The old woman’s words came as a relief to Zain. She felt as though she’d been freed from a heavy burden. She’d learned from the time she was a little girl to keep her suffering to herself, mostly to spite the aunts who tried to keep her at their mercy. Did all that really happen? Or am I just imagining it? So many memories are hazy. Losing her mother as a little girl had been traumatic, and she wasn’t sure she really wanted to get over it. Even so, she preferred to focus on the future rather than dwelling on the past. She recalled the outbursts of rage she’d endured as a child whenever she tried to assert herself, and the more she thought about it, the more she rebelled against the familial repression that masked itself as altruistic concern.
Grandma Hayat added, “A lot of people are going to ask you why you left Waseem. Some of them will want to gloat, some will be looking for something to gossip about at the reception,2 and some will want to use your story to scare their daughters away from doing the same. If anybody asks you why you’re getting a divorce after you were so in love, just say, ‘It wasn’t meant to be!’ After all, everybody believes in fate.”
Zain figured her grandmother was probably right. Don’t wear yourself out trying to explain things to other people, or even to yourself. Love was born. Love died. That’s that. Beware of explaining the gory details to people who couldn’t care less about you and your feelings, and who just want a scandal to wag their tongues about. What happened, happened. And you survived it. So don’t let it destroy you now.
In a resolute tone Zain repeated back to her grandma, “It wasn’t meant to be!” Then she added, “Can I go to my old room, or is it being used for something else?”
“Nothing’s changed,” her grandmother assured her, “and we always keep it clean. I always expected you back. You know nobody in the house liked him.”
Zain knew that, like a true-blooded Damascene woman, her grandmother knew how to keep quiet about something when circumstances required it. Her unspoken rule of thumb was: Tell people enough to help you in your future, but not enough to let them hold your past against you.
Fitna, a neighbor lady, came in. Seeing Zain back at her father’s house at an unexpected hour, suitcase in hand, she’d picked up on the scent of some juicy gossip. With typical Damascene urbanity, she asked, “Well, what brings you here, dear? It’s lovely to see you!”
“I’ve left my husband,” Zain replied straightforwardly, “and I’m going to ask for a divorce.”
“Oh, why would you do a thing like that, sweetheart?” Fitna probed, her appetite whetted.
“It just wasn’t meant to be,” Zain answered simply, her eyes meeting her grandmother’s. She was pleased with herself for not saying any more than this to her neighbor, or even to her cousin. When her cousin telephoned asking if she could come by Zain’s workplace, Zain was taken completely by surprise. It was the first telephone call she’d gotten from her in her life. What’s going on? Has word gotten around so fast that the whole family knows about it already? Or is this just a coincidence?
“How did you know I was here?” Zain asked her.
“Oh,” she said, “I called my uncle to ask for your number at the library, and he said you were at home today.”
Zain went to her room, and her grandmother followed her. Despite her earlier advice to Zain not to tell her secrets to anyone, she couldn’t contain her own curiosity. “What happened?” she asked anxiously. “Aren’t you going to miss him? Are you sure about this?”
“Don’t worry, Grandma,” Zain replied. “He’s given me no reason to miss him!”
* * *
Waseem sighed with satisfaction as he drove to his family’s house for lunch. Man, have I got it made! I’m getting rid of that shitty wife of mine, Zain Khayyal. And since she’s asking for the divorce herself, it’ll cost me a lot less. I was an idiot to marry her in the first place. On the other hand, though, it makes me mad that she was uppity with me, and that she’s the one saying she wants out. In any case, I’ll come out without any material losses to speak of. That damned lawyer-dad of hers set her divorce dowry3 ridiculously high—it comes to nearly the price of a three-story building. It never occurred to him that if we split up, I’d make her waive all her financial claims against me before I agreed to a divorce!
I doubt if there’s a man on earth who’d put up with a wife like her. Zain’s unbearable. Sure, she’s got a delicate, feminine look about her, but she’s as tough as a man, and she’s always trying to act like one. Instead of staying home and cooking for me and whoever I’m in the mood to invite over, she gets up at the crack of dawn to go to her job at the library, and then to the university. She doesn’t even go to hair salons or doll herself up so that she’ll be looking her best when I get home from work, from hanging out with friends, or from hooking up with other women. She’s got no business knowing where I’ve been or who I’ve been with. Her job is to do what I say and be content with what she’s got.
My poor mom likes Zain even though I’ve told her how awful she is. She even fixes food for us every day and either sends it over or has me pass by and get it. It doesn’t even occur to Zain that her priority should be to set up shop in the kitchen and learn how to cook from my mom so that she can make feasts for my friends whenever I want her to. Instead, she thinks she’s my equal, as if we had two men in the house. She goes to her job and comes home tired. Then she buries herself in her books and doesn’t give a damn whether I stay home or go out for the evening.
So I’m ecstatic to be getting divorced! But the fact that she seems even more excited and happy about it than I am makes me mad. She might even come to the court for the divorce proceedings all by herself. I suppose she won’t feel intimidated by the judge, or bat an eyelid when I stand next to her. Those damned books of her are the real reason we’re splitting up. They’ve ruined her mind.
The crazy girl used to chatter away to me about things I didn’t understand, and were boring as hell. She would say, “The only person who doesn’t make fun of me for getting engrossed in reading and writing is my dad. When I study Western literature and read the books my dad shows me from the Arabic tradition, I feel as though I find myself. I’m starting to understand the meaning of freedom, equality, and civilization – what it means to be a human being, and who I really am. You know, it’s really important to write about what you think and not to hold back. So if anybody tries to keep me from swimming in my inkwell, I just write that person off.”
The things she says are a pile of crap, if you ask me. All she does is try to show off how “cultured” she is. So even though I’m her husband, it looks like she’s written me off, and the kisses we used to steal in the orchards outside her father’s house in Sahat Al Midfaa don’t mean a thing anymore. Even back then I remember her going on ad nauseum about books until I started to yawn. All she really wanted was a house of her own where she could spread out her books and papers and study non-stop. I’d come home drunk at dawn after a night of carousing in taverns and bars, and she wouldn’t say a damned thing. She’d just go on getting dressed for work as if she couldn’t care less what I did. At first it made me suspicious. I thought maybe she had a lover. So I had my driver start spying on her. After a month of following her around, he told me she really did just go to work and to the university, and that she holed herself up at the library every evening till it closed. And that made me madder than ever. Damn it! No woman has the right to think she’s my equal, and that her job is more important than whether I spend my nights with her or out on the town.
She doesn’t care about money or threats or anything, and it irritates the hell out of me. Zain doesn’t give a damn anymore. It’s as if she doesn’t even hear my voice. Like an idiot, I thought of asking her grandmother Hayat to talk her into coming back. A lot of good that would do! I doubt if she’d even ask Zain why it is that after raising hell to get married to me, she’s raising hell now to get away from me.
Anyway, I’m not going to let her ruin my chance to get to know Lieutenant Nahi, who can help me bring in cheap merchandise from Beirut and sell it in Damascus for double the price.
A week earlier, Waseem’s business partner Badee had told him he’d met with Lieutenant Nahi and that after a wild night out, they’d talked about money. They’d also discussed the businessmen who were afraid of Socialism and who were bitter over the nationalization laws instituted under Abdel Nasser when Syria and Egypt formed the United Arab Republic. He’d reassured Waseem that business would flourish thanks to people like him and that they’d make huge profits trading in basically everything. He also hinted at a huge cut he’d be getting off every deal.
* * *
After starting her shift at the Syrian University Library one day, Zain received an unexpected visit from her cousin Fadila. It was the first time anybody in her family had come to her work place.
Zain felt concerned when she saw the look of distress on Fadila’s face. Still in distress herself over her abortion, she bypassed the usual niceties and asked Fadila straight out, “What brings you here?”
“Well,” Fadila hesitated. “I wanted to talk to you alone. It’s about Najm Rabi`ee, my first and only love. I need your encouragement.”
Zain’s features tightened. Misinterpreting the look on Zain’s face to mean she objected to Najm because he was poor and from a village, Fadila quickly added, “Najm isn’t poor, by the way! You may have read in the newspapers a few days ago that an uncle of his who’s emigrated to Gabon left him a huge fortune. Maybe he did it as a way of thumbing his nose at everybody else!”
Appreciating the fact that her cousin had sought her out for help, Zain measured her words with the greatest of care. “Well,” she began, “even if the news reports are true—and I doubt that they are—money isn’t the problem here. The problem has to do with love itself. What I mean is that something changes after people get married.”
“But I really do love Najm, and I need your support,” Fadila pleaded. “You’re the Ziqaq Al Yasmin Troublemaker, as the neighbor ladies refer to you, or the Ziqaq Al Yasmin Insurgent, as my educated Najm prefers to call you!”
The two of them burst out laughing. “Excuse me,” Zain said. “Dr. Jean needs help checking out some books. I’ll be right back. Wait for me here.”
Hardly had Zain taken a step in Dr. Jean’s direction when her coworker, Ikram, came rushing enthusiastically to the professor’s assistance. Ikram was obviously smitten with Dr. Jean and determined to catch his eye. Love… it bubbles up all around me in the faces of friends, relatives, and strangers alike. Love… that colorful, infectious sentiment surrounded by Beethoven’s music to Elise, and Chopin’s tears dripping blood-like onto the piano keys as he played for the hard-hearted George Sand. Chopin professed to belong to Sand. She believed him, and so did the critics. But I don’t. Artists aren’t faithful to anyone or anything but their craft. I know it from my recent experience with words.
When Zain rejoined Fadila, the latter gushed, “I want to be like you! So I’ve told people I’m in love with Najm and that I don’t want to marry Mutaa! But I need you to stick up for me to other family members, since you led the way by telling people how things were going to be and marrying the person you were in love with.”
Zain nearly weakened before her cousin’s barrage of earnest pronouncements. She was so impassioned, and her heart so on fire for her beloved Najm. Zain felt ashamed not to be able to play the role of the self-sacrificing heroine of movies and romance novels. However, the owl came in through the window, perched on Zain’s shoulder, and said what needed to be said.
“Listen, Fadila,” Zain confessed. “You know I love you. But the fact is, I left Waseem a couple of days ago and I’m asking for a divorce. Things didn’t work out. I made a huge mistake. But that doesn’t mean every first love has to be a failure. It’s just that mine was a failure.”
“Oh my God!” Fadila gasped. “I don’t believe it.”
“Life is unbelievable sometimes,” Zain conceded. “But like I said, my failed relationship doesn’t mean everybody who falls in love will fail the way I did. And it doesn’t mean you’re going to fail. You’re another girl, with another man, and the two of you have your own story. I’ve lost hope in this love, but I haven’t lost hope in love itself. Go ahead with what you think is right for you, and don’t be afraid. But just remember: There’s no such thing as a ‘love insurance policy.’”
“And why would you want to divorce him?” Fadila sputtered in an outburst of what seemed like personal hostility.
Remembering her grandmother’s advice, Zain said evenly, “It just wasn’t meant to be. Everything comes down in the end to what was, or wasn’t, meant to be. It’s a matter of destiny.”
A student came up and requested help finding a book. Excusing herself momentarily, Zain accompanied the student to the bookshelves. But when she came back, Fadila had disappeared.
Once she was home, Zain holed herself up in her old room, the room where for so long she had sworn by Waseem’s name and lit him love candles. She nearly cried. But the friendly owl that her mother always sent her in times of need landed comfortingly on her bed. She heard her mother whisper, as she had at the moment she died, “Don’t be afraid of any of them. Don’t back down. Don’t give up your life for somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
Zain stretched out on the bed, still exhausted from the abortion a few days earlier. I made a mistake, and now I’m correcting it. I’m paying the price. I have to get a divorce no matter what if I’m going to survive. Then let come what may. I’ll be rebelling against people’s love for me, and that’s hard. I’ll also be rebelling against their rejection of me, and that’s a relief! I’m a boulder on Mt. Qasioun.