When the Apricots Bloom
Page 30
“Everyone is very nice, thank you.” Huda bobbed her head. “Not as kind as Mr. Tom, of course, but very welcoming.”
Instead of being fired for taking the Land Cruiser, as she expected, Huda managed to get a part-time job at the Australian embassy in Amman—largely thanks to Ally. She’d told Tom and the ambassador that when she learned the mukhabarat were harassing Huda and Khalid, she convinced them to escape with her. It was all her idea, she said.
Ally didn’t tell them that Hanan was in the back seat when they crossed the border. And she didn’t tell them about the Bolt Cutter. Huda wondered, when Ally saw Tom in person, would she be able to hold her secrets inside? Or would she turn to him late at night and whisper in his ear of the red fan of blood and how it was so very bright against the pale sand?
Huda had thought that once she left Iraq, she could leave all the lies and manipulation behind. But lies didn’t take kindly to being forgotten, they clung to her pant leg, even as she ran for the door.
“I hope Khalid’s doing okay.” Ally smiled, but Huda thought she saw mistrust surface in her deep blue gaze. As Huda knew too well, to forgive was one thing, to forget another. Deception, betrayal, death, these could not simply be exiled from memory. Even forgiveness was not a one-off, or guaranteed to last forever.
Huda noticed two young men gawking at Ally. The women traded glances and rolled their eyes in unison.
“Shall I give them a lecture on respectability?” said Huda.
“Respectability?” Ally glanced behind her, and from side to side. She leaned against Huda’s shoulder and muttered, “Hang on, I better find some first.”
“I would lend you some,” Huda deadpanned. “But I lost mine years ago. I think it was back when I was dealing blackjack at that casino on the river.”
The two women bent their heads together and snickered.
Maybe forgiveness was a daily exercise, Huda thought, kept alive by unremarkable acts, like waiting with a friend for a late bus to come in, or sharing bad jokes. Perhaps Ally’s broken trust could be repaired. And maybe in turn, Huda could forgive Rania for her costly secrets. But it would take work, and something even more difficult, truth.
Huda took a breath.
“I lied to you earlier.” She glanced at Ally. “Khalid is not doing fine. He’s depressed. He won’t talk to me.”
Ally looped her arm around Huda’s shoulders.
“What about Abdul Amir? Maybe Khalid will talk to him?”
“You’re right.” Huda nodded. “He’d probably understand what Khalid is feeling better than anyone else.”
“How is he doing? Is he still in Basra?”
“He’s staying with his family, in his village.” Huda stared at the sidewalk.
Abdul Amir had done what she asked, and denounced her to the mukhabarat. He said he knew nothing about her escape plan, and that he planned to divorce her. Luckily, Abu Issa was sympathetic, but Abdul Amir was locked up in Abu Ghraib for a week anyway. Abu Issa promised he’d be treated well, so Abdul Amir was beaten only three times, and had his fingernails ripped out on only one hand. Huda sighed and rubbed her eyes. Not many people got to walk out of Abu Ghraib, let alone with all four limbs pretty much intact.
As for the Bolt Cutter, Abu Issa almost seemed pleased that he’d vanished. He told Abdul Amir he’d recommended his partner be punished for killing Hatim—not for the murder, but that he’d done it without prior authorization—only the Bolt Cutter went AWOL first. Or so he believed. Good riddance to that fool, he said. He’s got no respect for his superiors.
Huda still feared the regime would learn the truth about the Bolt Cutter. But as time passed, she figured the fishermen at Lake Habbaniyah had found his corpse and the mukhabarat ID in his pocket. The tribes in that area loathed the regime. They would have gladly fed his body to the carp out in the depths of the lake, sold his car to the cross-border smugglers, and erased all signs that he was ever there. Huda wished it was as easy to wipe him from Khalid’s memory.
“Are you okay?” Ally touched Huda’s arm. “You seem a million miles away.”
A grimy minivan lurched to a stop at the curb. The crowd shuffled closer, waiting for the doors to slide open. Rania emerged first, tossing a silky scarf around her shoulders. Somehow, she made the act of clambering from the ripped bucket seats look as graceful as ballet, but when she straightened up she had the numb look of a soldier fresh from the front lines.
Huda wanted to rush forward and embrace her, but her feet wouldn’t move. It was Ally who stepped forward, pulling Huda behind her.
“Rania, thank goodness you’re here.” The young woman paused. “I’m sorry about your mom. Please, accept my condolences.”
“Allah has set a term for everyone,” replied Rania. She bent down to retrieve her suitcase, but not before Huda saw the brief glint of tears in her eyes.
“May Allah make heaven her abode,” said Huda quietly, hoping the ritual words of condolence provided a little comfort. Rania had never been a traditional woman, but she was clearly trying to honor the Muslim custom of limiting public displays of grief.
“We’ve been so worried about you,” said Ally.
“I left just in time.” Rania paused and glanced over her shoulder. Even now, far from Baghdad, she couldn’t bring herself to speak freely. “His son is traveling to Basra this weekend. Malik told me he plans to send for Hanan.” Rania shuddered. “He’s going to be furious when he finds out she’s not there.”
“You’ll feel much better when you and Hanan are together.” Huda touched Rania’s shoulder and pointed up the hill to a small café. “You must be thirsty. Let’s order a cool drink and you can tell us all about your plans for London.”
Rania met Huda’s gaze for the first time.
“I can’t thank you enough; truly, I wish I could.” The shadows under Rania’s eyes were the color of storm clouds. She glanced at Ally. “Or you, my dear. I will always be in your debt.”
Behind them, a bus honked and took off, spewing gray exhaust from its tail pipe. The three woman started toward the café.
“How about we order coffee to go with that cool drink.” Ally grinned slyly at Huda. “Maybe you can look at the grounds and predict what the future has in store?”
They reached the top of the hill and paused to survey the city. Limestone houses gleamed under a cloudless sky that seemed to stretch on forever. Baghdad was six hundred miles away, and Huda didn’t know if they could ever return. But she took comfort that the three of them could stare into the same blue heaven, and hold on to hope for paradise.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
When the Apricots Bloom is a work of fiction, but it is inspired by my real-life experiences living in Iraq under the Saddam Hussein regime and later during the Iraq War. I was thirty-one when I arrived in Baghdad, and like the character Ally in this book, I suddenly went from being a journalist and professional in my own right to “a dependent spouse,” the unflattering visa category for the partners of diplomats and UN workers. And as in this novel, I developed a close relationship with a woman like Huda—an informant secretly reporting back to the regime on where I went, what I saw, and who I spoke with.
Once the regime fell, the truth came out. I didn’t blame the woman who so often called herself my Iraqi sister. I understood that no was not an option with the mukhabarat. And by then, I was no longer the same naive person who first journeyed to Baghdad. As I recounted in my 2007 memoir, my former workplace had been destroyed by a suicide bombing. I buried a dear friend, survived sexual assault, and learned that under extreme circumstances good people can make bad choices. As the tyranny of Saddam’s regime was replaced by the chaos of war, it became clear that the best of intentions could go horribly wrong.
More than ten years later, I was still dwelling on all that happened in Iraq. PTSD was partly to blame, but I also couldn’t stop wondering, Had it been just a job for my sister? Were we simply informant and target? Or had we been friends too? Sometimes real life is just a
s complex as fiction—motivations blurred, lines crossed and redrawn. And so I started work on this novel, exploring questions of truth, loyalty, and friendship that I had left unanswered in Baghdad.
While this experience inspired the starting point for When the Apricots Bloom, and many small details came straight from reality, the plot is a work of fiction. I am not Ally. Huda does not exist. Neither does Rania. However, I did my best to paint an accurate portrait of life under Saddam Hussein at that moment in time. I’m indebted to Ban al-Dhayi, Samir al-Badri, and Ghada Kachachi for their encouragement, feedback, and advice in this endeavor. That said, any mistakes or alternations in fact are mine alone. I’d also like to thank my agent, Heather Jackson; my editor, John Scognamiglio at Kensington; as well as Natasha, Zaha, Jennifer, Sahar, Fatemeh, Wendra, Chelsea, Chris at Petworth Neighborhood Library, and the other members of my two writing groups. My wonderful husband, Geoff, went above and beyond. I truly could not have done this without him.
I also want to acknowledge the important discussion around our own voices. The publishing industry has marginalized authors outside of the white, Western mainstream for far too long. This needs to change. In this polarized era, we need more diverse books, written by diverse authors, in settings and situations that reflect the deep richness of our world. At the same time, like PEN America, I don’t believe in setting “rigid rules” about who has the right to tell which stories, or that an author should be confined to creating only characters with a similar background or genetic code. I’ve spent more than twenty years living outside of my home country, in Iraq, Thailand, Sri Lanka, Brazil, and the United States and Canada. I’ve lived in tiny rural communities and heaving metropolises. Throughout, I’ve found that while we might pray in a certain way, cover our hair or not, bake our bread flat or leavened, at heart we want the same things—safety, peace, love. We share far more in common than that which divides us. I hope this book shows that.
A READING GROUP GUIDE
WHEN THE APRICOTS BLOOM
ABOUT THIS GUIDE
The suggested questions are included to enhance your group’s reading of Gina Wilkinson’s When the Apricots Bloom.
Discussion Questions
1. When the Apricots Bloom takes place in Baghdad, during the rule of the dictator Saddam Hussein, at a time when Western sanctions kept Iraq virtually cut off from the rest of the world. What did you learn about life for ordinary Iraqis, like Huda, that surprised you?
2. If you were in Huda’s situation, how would you have responded to the orders from the secret police? Should Huda have felt guilty about any of her actions? What about the money she pockets when Ally buys a lemon tree, or her threats later to the nurseryman?
3. Compared to Huda, how does Rania handle pressure from the regime? To what extent does her family’s status protect her, or is that just an illusion? Rania is also an artist—a respected role in Iraqi society. How does this compare to prevailing attitudes toward artists in your own culture?
4. Ally is desperate to find a connection with her mother. Given the restrictions she’s under, do you think her subterfuge is justified, or is her search for clues to her mother’s past irresponsible? What would you have done differently? Were you surprised by her mother’s history?
5. Huda’s husband, Abdul Amir, plays a key role in the book. To what extent does he influence Huda’s decisions? At the end of the novel, how do you feel about his character? How did your perception of him alter over time?
6. The starting point for When the Apricots Bloom was inspired by the author’s own experiences, when she was befriended by a woman working as an informant for Saddam Hussein’s secret police. Did her portrayal of life in Baghdad seem realistic to you? How believable was the relationship between the three women?
7. The novel alternates between Huda’s, Rania’s, and Ally’s points of view. How are their worldviews and attitudes reflected in their narrative styles? Do you prefer one to the other? How would the novel have differed if it had been told from only one perspective?
8. In the Author’s Note, the author references the debate over “our own voices.” To what extent do you agree or disagree with her statements? Do you think it was appropriate for her to write from the point of view of an Iraqi woman?
9. When the Apricots Bloom ends with Huda, Rania, and Ally reuniting in Jordan. What do you think the future holds for them? Did this epilogue strengthen the book, or would it have had more impact if it ended with the previous chapter?