28

Rothschild Boulevard

She was standing at the intersection of Rothschild and Allenby, right where Ariel left her. After he disappeared in the distance on his way to Chez George, she went back to humming a tune thinking it would ward off a fear masked with boredom. A car slowed down and its passengers lowered their windows and started pointing and gesturing lewdly while laughing.

“Dfokim. Crazy sons of bitches,” she muttered with a smile.

She tried to ignore them, hoping they would give up, but they didn’t. They yelled at her to get in, promising to pay whatever she asked for. It didn’t feel right and they wouldn’t leave. One of them got out and wanted to take her by the hand to force her into the car. He went back and left the door open. Their speech was slurred and he reeked of alcohol. Dana’s heart was pounding and Khamis al-Hazin was somewhere where he couldn’t hear this scared heart.

She wore a fake smile as she approached the car, toyed with the driver’s hair, kissed his check, and took his hand and put it on her breast.

“You go ahead to Nahlat Benyamin, across from Allenby. I’ll be there in five. I just need to fix myself up.”

They drove away laughing and cheering. As soon as they got far enough, she took off her high heels, and ran in the opposite direction to Chez George’s.

They called her Dana, after the young Moroccan who had a sex change and became a woman and called herself Dana International. She was just Dana. With no family name, or sex change.

She doesn’t know where she got her dark skin color from. Both her parents were blond. Khamis al-Hazin told her that she might be one of the stolen Yemenite children. Why didn’t she have any photos of her pregnant mother? She doesn’t look anything like her parents. But she didn’t like Khamis’s theory. It was one of those Arab myths as far as she was concerned. She looks like her maternal grandmother, whom she never saw because she died right before her birth. Assuming that all Arabs are dark, or all Europeans are blond, is silly anyway.

Passersby stop and gaze at her legs. They cannot tell for sure if she is a man or a woman. They stare at her pomegranate breasts and the bulge under her tight leather skirt (that’s what she always wore).

Khamis used to tease her by asking if she put something to inflate her penis and make it bulge, or if she had one to start with. She would dare him to touch what’s between her thighs to make sure. He would smile and his wide eyes would soften, but he wouldn’t say anything.

“A shy pimp? When they hear you cursing, they wouldn’t believe you are so tender!” Dana said laughing. Khamis al-Hazin didn’t know much about Dana, except that she lived in a studio apartment on Bin Zion and that she didn’t host customers. She took him to her place once when he was sick and made him tea until it stopped raining. He saw the photographs of her parents she had on the wall. She told him then that her mother had died of a heart attack. Her father was old and she couldn’t take care of him because she was still too young. Khamis doesn’t know how she ended up in this profession. Nor does he know why he agreed to be her pimp. He knows that money was one primary reason. Plus, working at night didn’t conflict with his work hours at the bakery in Jaffa.

They chatted about politics sometimes and about how expensive things were in Jaffa, where he lives. He talked about his father’s orchards, which were in limbo at Israeli courts. He didn’t want to sell them, and the government refused to lift the liens on the land, which was saddled with mounds of taxes. Khamis thought it was strange that the government didn’t expropriate the land. It had raped the entire country and wasn’t in need of a lawful way to take things away. He would accentuate the verb “raped” whenever he spoke about the government, or anything or person he called “they.” “They” always stood for the powerful ones whose faces we never see, but we do experience the consequences of their actions. He sent his children to the best schools in Jaffa because he wanted them to finish college, but he rarely saw them.

He was known to everyone as “Khamis al-Hazin.” Every Thursday morning, he would call the Arabic section of the Voice of Israel to request Fayruz’s song, “One Day We’ll Return.” The first time he called, the presenter asked him what his name was. He said “Khamis” (Thursday). “Which Thursday?” she asked. “Al-Hazin” (The Sad One) he said. It wasn’t clear whether this was an attribute, or his actual family name.

Khamis al-Hazin became even more famous than the presenter. But he rejected the messages that were sent to the station from listeners all over the Arab world, who wanted to correspond with him. He refused to accept messages that tried to commiserate. When the presenter repeated the same question: Why did he request “One Day We’ll Return” when he was already in Jaffa? He used to say it’s because he loved it, and longed for something he didn’t quite know. Moreover, it was the only song that made him cry. One of the listeners wrote saying they were tired of listening to this song, and that he had to choose another one and stop listening to maudlin songs. Khamis was silent when the presenter said that, then he said:

“Alright, but if this one song is too much for them, they can turn down the volume when it’s on. I still want to request it today and dedicate it to all our people, wherever they may be. In Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, and even in Jordan. Oh, for God’s sake, let’s not get into politics now. Just play ‘One Day We’ll Return’ and I dedicate it to all the people of Jaffa, anywhere in the world.”

A lie brought Khamis and Dana together. Were it not for that lie, they would’ve passed by each other like two parallel lines without ever intersecting. Khamis was seated at the bus stop near the intersection of Rothschild and Allenby. Winter had overstayed that year. Dana stood at the bus stop wrapped in her long gray coat, to escape the rain. A suspicious-looking man whose eyes were bloodshot approached her. He was looking sideways, as if running away from someone. He asked her if she’d seen the prostitutes who usually stand on the sidewalk. She said that she hadn’t and didn’t know what he was talking about.

She laughed once the man disappeared in the rain. Khamis asked her in a hesitant voice why she did. She said the man looked suspicious and, not having a pimp to protect her, she didn’t want to take a chance. He smiled as he bit his cigarette to suck some smoke, and asked her why she was pimpless. The last one was a drug addict and ended up in prison. She wanted someone to protect her and not force her to do things she didn’t want to do.

Dana offered him 10 percent of what she makes. She didn’t know why she offered a stranger this job, and he didn’t know why he accepted right away. But it was a done deal. Perhaps his strong build and the scar on his face gave the false impression that he was seasoned in the business. But that scar was a trace from childhood mischievousness and he had nothing to do with the city’s underworld. His heart was softer than a butterfly’s wing. But hearts are invisible. He protected Dana these past three years. The biggest challenge he faced was a shouting match. And it was solved peacefully because fate helped him. When his curses came out loud and clear in a Jaffan dialect familiar to local ears, cars came from every direction, as if they had been waiting. It seemed as if Khamis had men who protected him everywhere. This story spread and it was sufficient to give him peace of mind.

The national pastime for young Palestinian men was showing off and driving their cars at an elephant’s speed in Jaffa’s streets. Sometimes they used to go to the other side: to the White City. They were passing by when they heard someone shouting in Arabic. Rushing to the spot, they found Khamis screaming at a customer who had refused to pay Dana. The young men surrounded him and he and all those who had gathered around were scared. Something about Jaffans scares the denizens of Tel Aviv.

The young men would pass by every once in a while and would greet Khamis, who’d become a landmark for them. Seeing him standing there made them feel at home in that spot, which they frequented from time to time.

“Ahlan wa sahlan, dear. Ahlan brother. Ahlayn nawwara.”

Khamis greeted back those who passed by, be they Jaffans or not, as he stood on the sidewalk in Tel Aviv, guarding Dana.