The Allspice Bath

by Sonia Saikaley

  Youssef breathed deeply. “The name dies with me in my immediate family because I don’t have sons, but I hope and pray you have a handful of handsome boys.”

  Adele pretended not to hear, but her father went on.

  “Having a boy is so important. Girls are okay, but sons are crucial to maintaining our bloodline.”

  Rafic nodded politely, turning down a narrow street and swerving to avoid another vehicle that almost crashed into them. “Kis imak!” Rafic cursed. Adele’s body plunged forward. Her father gripped her and asked her if she were all right. She nodded, pressing herself into the tattered cushions of the front seat.

  Two hours later, Rafic parked the car in front of a restaurant in Zahlé, a red-roofed town near the eastern foothills of Mount Sannine. Everyone quickly slid out and stretched their legs and arms. The riverside café was a flat red brick building with wide windows and a large patio filled with plastic tables and chairs. Adele stepped into the shade of a tree and immediately felt cooler.

  Rafic now stood beside her and pointed, “Cousin, you see that river?”

  She nodded.

  “That’s the Bardouni River. It flows out of Mount Sannine, down through Zahlé. Very beautiful.”

  “Yes, it is,” she agreed, smiling.

  Youssef walked towards them and genially slapped Rafic’s back. “Okay, enough with the tour guide. Let’s eat.” He then led Rafic into the restaurant, leaving Adele standing alone outside.

  Adele stood open-mouthed, stung by the interruption, until Mona grabbed her by the arm and dragged her inside. The air smelled like the spices that Samira cooked with back home. “Come on, Monkey. Don’t get jealous. Babba hasn’t seen Rafic in ages. It’s only natural for him to feel affection for him.”

  “Yeah, but what about us? Why doesn’t Babba act all happy when he’s with us?” Adele asked.

  “We’re too close to him. We haven’t been absent long enough to let his heart grow fonder.” Mona poked Adele in the ribs and tried to get her to smile.

  “You mean Babba has a heart?” Adele said sarcastically.

  “Yeah,” Mona said, tapping Adele’s stomach, “but it’s hard to see because of his potbelly!”

  The sisters laughed before joining the others on the patio and pulling out the plastic chairs from under the simple, white table. Adele sat down, briefly closed her eyes, and listened to the rushing cascade of the river.

  After maza was served, Adele watched a man in baggy trousers with a fez on his head as he stood at their table and poured steaming ahweh into everyone’s cups. His curling moustache reminded her of her father. This place was so different from back home, she thought, where waiters and waitresses were always rushing to serve impatient customers and almost pushing them out the door to make room for others. This café was peaceful with the trees and water surrounding it.

  She watched her father, who was in deep conversation with Rafic. In the glow of the diminishing sun, the lines around Youssef’s deep-set eyes had softened. Suddenly Adele sat up, leaned her elbows on the table and looked closely at her father—there was a widening grin on his face again! Sighing, she fell back in the chair and stared again at the man in the baggy trousers; he had moved to another table and provided the diners with a hookah. These customers were middle-aged men. They wore frayed sweaters over stained white shirts in spite of the evening heat. Some of them held turquoise worry beads in their dark hands, rolling each stone to the next, while others passed the hookah between them, taking short puffs on the pipe and drawing out a line of apple-scented smoke. A haze of tobacco clouded the patio. Adele covered her mouth as she coughed. Her sisters sat tensely in their chairs, listening to the conversation between Youssef and Rafic. Even Samira sat quietly with her head in her hands. She frowned when Youssef patted Rafic’s back and proclaimed, “You’re like the son Samira didn’t give me. I’m so proud of you.”

  “Thank you, Uncle,” he said, smiling timidly. He glanced across at Adele and her sisters, then lowered his eyes and stared at the small cup in his hands.

  Adele looked away too, the colour in her face disappearing like the sun behind the cliffs of the Bardouni river.

  It was after midnight when they arrived in her parents’ village. In Kfarmichki many of the lights of the stone houses were on and several people were gathered on balconies and flat roofs, playing cards and drinking ahweh or arak, empty plates of maza pushed aside. The houses they passed on their way to her father’s childhood home didn’t stand out from each other. They were small grey-stoned dwellings with diminutive windows and red roofs. Yet they seemed to accommodate a lot of people; dozens of men and women lounged in plastic chairs outside, slapping cards on a table.

  The car coated these homes with orange dust as they drove by, even though Rafic had slowed the Mercedes down when he entered the village, easing it through the narrow dirt roads. By the time they reached Youssef’s home, the dust had lifted into the surrounding hills and olive trees. Samira, Rima, Katrina, and Mona jumped out of the Mercedes along with Rafic. Adele nudged her father on the arm; he had fallen asleep. Youssef woke with a start. He blinked a few times, frowning in confusion. She wasn’t sure whether to say, you’re home. Was this still his home? she wondered. He stumbled out of the car, Adele following. Light from the homes around them filled the surrounding darkness. He rubbed his eyes, then stared out into the yard where fig and olive trees abounded and a donkey lay asleep. The animal’s sudden snort made Adele jump. Youssef lightly touched her shoulder. “Don’t be afraid of the donkey. It won’t kick … as long as you don’t argue back with it like you do with your Babba!” He burst into laughter.

  She didn’t smile.

  “Let’s call a truce, okay?” he said suddenly, holding out his hand. “No arguments while we’re here.”

  She stretched out her hand and firmly shook her father’s, their palms sticking together. She smiled and then helped her cousin carry their luggage up the steps; she slowly walked inside her father’s childhood home.

  The smell of old musty walls floated into Adele’s nose. She dragged the suitcases inside, following her sisters and parents as they too carried their bags and headed down the hallway, but Adele stopped in the living room, which was crowded with four couches, a table and a couple of chairs. Deep violet and red vases engraved with gold flowers were set between the sofas.

  A man emerged from the dark hallway into the softly-lit room. “Marhaba, Adele,” he said. “I’m your Uncle Issa.” He had striking similarities to her father: a receding hairline, though his hair was still black rather than grey, and a round belly. Adele’s frame towered over his as he leaned in and embraced her.

  She patted his back while he held her tight in his arms. His smell— the scent of earth and sweat—filled her nostrils but she didn’t move away or let go. Her uncle came to life, a man she had only known in old black and white photographs, while he hugged her. She glanced at her father who stood a few feet away, his face blank. Youssef sat down on a torn brown sofa and looked around, not letting his gaze meet hers. She wondered if he felt envious. After the long embrace, Adele let go of her uncle and looked into his eyes, which were as sunken as Youssef’s, but not so lined; his skin was tanned from fieldwork.

  “Uncle Issa, it’s so good to finally meet you. You’re as handsome as I imagined,” she teased, then quickly glanced at her father, who finally looked up.

  “Shukran, Adele,” Issa said, grinning.

  “What did you expect, Adele? He takes after his older handsome brother,” Youssef said, throwing his head back in laughter.

  This was the first time she had seen her father so carefree and happy. She laughed, too, and slapped her forehead. “Of course, Babba, how could I forget?”

  Smiling, Issa took the bags from Adele’s hands and followed Rafic into the adjacent room where Adele and her sisters would sleep during their visit. She could hear her mother and sisters
chatting in the kitchen with her Aunt Frida. Then she followed her uncle and cousin into the living room and sat on the sofa beside her father, her eyes exploring the walls covered with photographs, a pendant of the Lebanese flag, and pictures of Jesus. Adele rose from the couch and stood in front of one of the old photographs, glancing from the portrait back to her father.

  Youssef was also taking in the room. “The house still looks the same. It’s exactly as how I remember it. Not much has changed,” he said in low voice. Adele moved closer to the photograph. Three children sat on the back of a donkey; a woman and a man stood at either end of the animal. She stretched her neck to get a better look at the middle-aged man in the photo, presumably the father of the small clan. He certainly resembled Youssef. This was Jido Salim, her grandfather, Adele guessed. His lips were chapped and pursed in a tight line and furrows were engraved deeply on his sunburnt face. He had dark circles under his small eyes and deep wrinkles in his forehead. Adele looked at the woman whose hands rested protectively on the eldest child’s back. She had a slight hunch and Adele wondered if Sito, her grandmother, had had to fetch water from the well and river with a carrying pole over her shoulders, hoisting buckets on either end of the wooden stick. She had heard various stories over the years about Youssef’s mother, how she struggled raising the children and, at the same time, took care of the fieldwork alongside her husband. Adele remembered photos of her paternal grandmother, taken when she was old, her skin leathery by years of working in the sun. She was poor, always dressed in ragged clothes, and her toothless mouth hung half-open.

  But in the photo on the wall, her grandmother was still a younger woman, still strong. Adele examined the children positioned on the back of the donkey. Mostly though, she stared at the oldest of the three, her father. He had a serious, almost sad expression. He wasn’t looking into the camera, but at Jido Salim, his Babba, who stood at the front of the donkey holding the rope, and Adele recognized his look and all its longing. Jido Salim, she realized now, looked angry. She thought how that very anger had influenced so much of her own life and she was thankful when her uncle rested his hand on her shoulder.

  “So, Youssef tells me you’re the smart one in the family,” Issa said, dropping his arm and heading towards Youssef where he sank into the couch next to him, making the springs squeak loudly.

  Adele’s jaw dropped at her uncle’s comment. The smart one in the family. She glanced at her father, waiting for a rebuttal or a denial. But Youssef only smiled proudly, pressing his back into the sofa and patting his brother’s knee.

  “She wants to be a doctor,” Youssef said.

  “A psychologist,” Adele corrected. She really wanted to be an artist but her father wouldn’t allow her to follow that road. She sighed and turned her attention back to her uncle and father.

  “What’s that?” Issa asked, his thick eyebrows knitted together.

  Adele explained, speaking in her broken Arabic. “Um … it’s a doctor who studies the mind.” She tapped her finger against her head, then continued. “Say you feel sad and you don’t know why, you’d go to see a psychologist and talk about your life, family, problems. You talk and talk until you have a better understanding of yourself.”

  Issa shifted on the couch and faced Youssef. “Ayb. You’re letting your daughter do this? Talk with crazy people?”

  “They charge about a hundred dollars an hour. Good money,” Youssef said.

  “Even so. Why not be a regular doctor and fix broken bones, take care of colds … now that’s a respectable career, not some ‘doctor’ who speaks with crazy people,” Issa said. “Anyway, family problems should stay in the family. It’s ayb to discuss such matters with strangers.” He stopped, leaned close to Youssef’s ear and whispered, “I thought you said she was the smart one.”

  Adele puckered her forehead; she heard every word. She turned away from her father and uncle and looked hard at the old donkey in the photograph. She would be, she vowed, as stubborn as that animal.

  Lying in an unfamiliar bed that night, cramped between Mona and Katrina, Adele struggled to sleep, and failed. For a while she watched Rima in the small, metal cot across from the bed and listened to the soft breaths that escaped from her sisters’ mouths. She slowly raised her body with her forearms, then slid herself to the foot of the bed, taking the crumpled sheets with her. Once she was up, she covered her sisters, and tiptoed down the dark hallway and into the living room. She sat on the edge of the window. Staring into the horizon, she watched the shadows of the olive trees against the mountains as if moving with them in a mysterious dance under the bluish-white moonlight. She felt homesick; her stomach churned. She missed her friends, her bicycle, and mostly Mrs. Foster. She looked at the full moon, fearing that during this visit her neighbour would pass away. Before she could stop herself, she had begun to cry. Her shoulders shook until she felt the weight of someone’s hands on them, squeezing her tight and steadying her whimpering body.

  “What’s wrong?” Youssef whispered, leaning close to her ear.

  “Nothing, Babba,” Adele lied, wiping her eyes.

  He stepped back, his hands still on her shoulders. “Why are you crying then?”

  “I miss Mrs….” she caught herself, “I miss home.”

  He dropped his arms to his sides. “You’ll be back soon enough and then I’ll be homesick.”

  Youssef’s face appeared grey in the moonlit room. She wiped her eyes. “It must’ve been hard for you to leave Lebanon. Do you ever want to move back, make a life here, Babba?” she asked gently.

  He snickered, slapping his right hand against his thigh. “With the goats and donkeys! That’s a life.”

  “If that would’ve made you happy, yes.”

  “You don’t understand, Adele. You talk too much and never listen.”

  She sat up straight. “I’m listening now, Babba. I want to understand you.”

  Youssef turned around and pointed at the photograph on the wall, the one with the donkey and children. “Your Jido wasn’t the easiest man to live with.”

  Neither are you, she thought.

  “I had to leave to a start a new life for myself.”

  Too loudly, she replied, “Like I wanted to do when I got accepted to the University of Toronto?”

  “No, this is different,” Youssef said, shaking his head and stepping away from her.

  “How so?”

  “A daughter must stay with her parents until she’s married, but a boy can leave if he likes. It’s just the way things are.”

  “It’s so unfair!”

  “Boys don’t have to worry about certain things.”

  “What things?” she asked, the nerves around her mouth tensing.

  “Female things.”

  “Like what?” she pushed, interested in hearing what her father thought about these concerns. Their whispering voices filled the small living room. The moonlight softened the usual rigidity of her father’s face. She mustered a small smile, reached out to touch her father’s arm then, unsure, let her hand drop in her lap.

  “If I have to tell you what they are, then you’re as dumb as that donkey!” he snapped, pointing to the animal in the front yard tied to the wooden fence.

  Adele turned away from him.

  “Boys have certain privileges, that’s all. If you had been a boy, I would’ve let you go to school outside of Ottawa but you were born a girl.”

  Adele said nothing. What could she say to that? Youssef remained quiet too, then he walked out of the house and stood in the yard beside the donkey. His shoulders were slightly bent as he reached down and stroked the donkey’s folded ears. Adele stared at her father’s shadow as it blended into the night. She shrank back against the wall of the window frame.

  She woke to the cry of a rooster. She lay with a stiff neck on the Persian rug in the living room then sat up quickly and rubbed her eyes, adjusting
them to the morning light that filled the stone house. Adele got up from the floor and stretched her arms above her head, releasing the kinks from her restless sleep. She stepped quietly across the floor, attracted to the light in the kitchen. Standing in the shadow of the doorway, she listened to the whispers of her father and uncle. How similar they sounded, she thought, their voices both harsh and deep.

  “It’s all been arranged, Youssef. No need to worry about anything. They’re very happy. Everyone knows about their son. They didn’t want people to know but it’s a village. Gossip travels. What can you expect?” Adele peered over the edge and saw Uncle Issa raising his hands in the air then slamming them on the kitchen table. “Everyone feels bad, of course. But at least now the boy has a chance of leaving this place, making money, and sending it back home to his family. He’s a good boy, too. Don’t worry about anything. Everything will work out, you’ll see,” Issa reassured.

  “Enshallah,” Youssef sighed.

  Adele’s fingers traced the rough, uneven wood of the doorway, pressing her head against the wall, and leaning closer to hear them better. She wondered what her father and uncle were discussing. A son for Youssef to take back to Canada? The son he always wanted? Her forehead furrowed.

  “Everything will work out,” Issa repeated.

  “Good, good,” Youssef said, more confident. Adele watched her father’s small hand clasp Uncle Issa’s. “It’s all settled then. When will we meet him?”

  “Today.”

  She stepped lightly back into the hallway when she heard the scraping of chairs on the kitchen floor. She scurried down the corridor and opened the door to the bedroom where her sisters lay asleep. As she closed the door behind her, another rooster in the yard began to crow. The high-pitched cry didn’t wake her sleeping sisters.

  A stone wall, messily constructed, and countless olive trees surrounded Youssef’s childhood home. While crossing the yard, Adele recalled her father’s stories of how he had built this wall. She placed the last dishes of maza on the beige cloth-covered table before taking her seat. A flower design had been carefully embroidered into the beige tablecloth. It was a shame that the plates had to cover the pattern, she thought, as she touched one of the intricately crafted flowers with her fingertips. Her father’s voice brought her back to the conversation.