The Silence and the Roar

by Nihad Sirees

  As I was saying, the Macedonians refused to deify Alexander despite the fact that he was a great conqueror who achieved splendid victories for his country. Consider this irony, dear reader, that as soon as Alexander entered the lands of Persia as a conqueror the people deified him, whereas the people of his own tribe condemned that deification and pushed back against it. History records one of his generals mockingly laughing out loud when he heard of this trend toward deification that Alexander the Great had been preparing to impose on them. Alexander imagined they were making fun of him and he felt rebuffed. But that did not eliminate the thought from his mind altogether; rather, he said the Asians had no objection and that he was like a god to them and they were his happy and willing slaves.

  We are willing slaves and the proof is in what was going on just a little while ago in the large plaza outside the hotel, where the Leader was toying with the people (the slaves) to the point that he sent out his military uniforms and his medals in order to make them go mad just by touching them. He loves to see the masses kill themselves on his behalf. As I walked over to Lama’s flat I saw more than one ambulance speed off silently, transporting whoever had been overwhelmed—and there were many of them in that crowd and that heat. One time a doctor informed me, asking to remain anonymous, that in every march like this one more than a hundred people die, whether trampled or suffocated, and twice that number would die in traffic accidents as people returned to their homes and villages.

  Why does the Leader love these marches so? Hannah Arendt discussed the relationship between the Leader and the masses, coming to the conclusion that the masses cannot live without a Leader, just as the Leader cannot live without masses. In other words, the Leader cannot exist without the masses just as there is no existence for the masses without the Leader—two poles, each one cannot exist without the other. We’re not talking about the individual people who constitute the masses here now, but about masses of humanity, hordes of human beings who can be found at a particular time in a particular place chanting for the Leader. I believe the Leader loses his self-confidence and gets depressed when too much time passes without him seeing the masses fill the streets in order to chant his name. As I already mentioned, the Leader regularly watched video clips of the masses chanting for him in marches or in crowded gatherings. He would do this in the interim between one march and the next, between one crowded gathering and another. I would venture to say that he does this to avoid losing his self-confidence. He had a habit of inviting guests into his video room to watch hours of those clips. I trust the reader will recall that he had invited over Mr. Ha’el, who wants to marry my mother, to watch these tapes. Television screens re-airing the most recent march fill out every corner of the Leader’s palace.

  After one of the gigantic marches held on the occasion of independence, in which the masses had been chanting for the Leader and nobody else (in spite of the fact that the Leader had only been a little boy when the foreign armies were evacuated), a grave error took place and the entire recording was lost. How did that happen? God only knows. There are some who say it was a premeditated act while others say that the technician made a mistake, using the original recording instead of a blank cassette and taping over its contents! What matters is that the Minister of Communications had to accompany the television producer to the palace in order to explain the situation to the Leader, who flipped his lid and whomped the producer with an ashtray instead of responding. I don’t know why the Leader got so upset. All the marches are the same and he could have found his own way to get over it, say, by sitting in the video room watching the previous march, for example. Also, the Minister and the TV producer proved to be “two stupid asses” because they could have saved face by simply handing over a recording of an earlier march since all of our marches are essentially the same. I swear the Leader would not be able to tell the difference. They are nothing but shrieking masses: the roar, the military march music and images of the Leader that are more numerous than the number of those stuffed into the streets and the plazas. It was a good throw but the ashtray didn’t strike the TV producer in the head, hitting him in the shoulder instead. Fearing that the Leader was about to fire them both, the Minister suggested that he and the producer restage the march, which could be held one week after the anniversary of independence. The idea impressed the Leader and he gave the necessary orders. The march was rescheduled and videotaped and now the Leader has a copy in his library.

  After a vigorous effort they were able to quiet the masses, which had carried on shouting and hollering for a long time, hypnotized by the scene the Leader had successfully orchestrated when he appeared after toying with them. Everyone on the balcony was gesturing for the masses to be silent. Apparently the Leader had something he wanted to say on this occasion. An unexpected silence fell that attracted Lama, who had been busy caressing me. Despite the fact that I had not reciprocated Lama’s advances and did not respond to her caresses except by getting erect as I followed everything that was happening on television, I felt utterly disconnected from what was happening as a result of that silence; in the wake of the roar that had been pounding my ears came this silence, and I was split in two. I could not tear my eyes away from the television to cast a glance at Lama’s head or follow what she was doing. Instead I was like someone under hypnosis, staring at the screen where the Leader appeared, preparing to open his mouth. But I was separated from all of that. I felt a mixture of pleasures: one was emanating from my loins; another was due to the interruption of the long roar and the onset of ringing that soon quieted down and grew softer in my ears; and one final pleasure was due to my separation from that world. Lama suddenly noticed the silence and raised her head. She wanted to know the reason for the silence and she saw how, at that very moment, the Leader made certain that the masses were ready to listen to what he had to say, so he opened his mouth to speak … but no! As though he had forgotten what he wanted to say, his mouth hung agape. At once she was swept away by a powerful fit of laughter that jolted me out of my condition, reconnecting me with reality here. I asked her what had happened that could make her burst out laughing like that.

  We switched off the television and sprawled out on the couch. The Leader’s voice continued assaulting us from outside, from all sides, from the direction of the stairwell, from the street. The stairwell annoyingly amplified sound, as if the television were still on.

  The fan was spinning on its highest setting but all that did was recirculate hot air. We were naked and our bodies were drenched with sweat. In order to stay cool Lama would go into the bathroom every fifteen minutes and stand in the shower for a moment, returning to roll around on top of me and then get up so I could feel a blast of air blowing from the fan and enjoy some coolness. She would also moisten a towel and wipe down my body. Because of the layout of her flat Lama had to invent new means to fight the heat, which included filling up plastic bags with water, tying them in a knot, placing them in the freezer and then bringing them out once they were frozen in order to slide them all over me, from my head down to my feet. I felt the pleasure of coolness most on my head and feet whereas on the rest of my skin I felt the sting of iciness that was no different than the sting of hotness. I preferred the wet towel that she rubbed all over my body as the fan spun and blew air at me. She made sure not to let my penis get so cold that it went limp. From the warmth and the hot air and our sweaty bodies and the game of physical cooling Lama used to play, some sort of desire would eventually pop out and we would make love. Lama came to learn how much I hate physical contact in that sweaty atmosphere. As soon as she stopped cooling us down with her special methods we would become completely soaked with sweat and our bodies would get all slimy. I recoil from the contact of two slimy, sticky bodies but Lama loves it and yearns for it all the time. Mostly I put up with it in order to satisfy her.

  The whole operation went on longer than usual because of the Leader’s speech, which was coming through the doors and the walls to reach us in a clear a
nd comprehensible voice. I got distracted whenever I heard him say a particular word or phrase, either rebutting him or repeating the word to myself in order to understand what he meant by it, but what distracted me the most were his grammatical mistakes. I discovered that he likes to assimilate subject and object although he could apply the circumstantial hal construction in an excellent manner and without making any mistakes. Among his other grammatical errors: misvoweling the possessed element in a possessive idafa construction or confusing the nominal sentence with the verbal sentence, so instead of saying “the liberation of the country,” he might say, “liberation, the country.” These mistakes distracted me, even when Lama and I were making love. And while I corrected the Leader’s grammatical mistakes in my mind, distant from what we were actually doing, Lama was passionately trying to come! Her panting and moaning would bring me back but soon I would drift away once again on account of a particular word or another grammatical mistake. In the moment when I heard the Leader defame the president of a neighboring country, the masses exploded into shouting and hollering and clapping as Lama shuddered and screamed out several short yelps before quieting down with a smile on her face.

  Lama’s bathroom is remarkably tranquil despite the fact that it has a small window overlooking the roof of the adjacent building; by tranquillity I don’t mean that when we fill the bathtub with water and sit in it that the Leader’s voice giving his speech can’t reach us but that it would reach us in a more muffled way, like some distant, unintelligible murmur. That noise did not prevent me from staying focused on Lama as she sat down on the edge of the tub. She berated herself for being so selfish and for being incapable of making me happy. I told her that the Leader’s speech and all the day’s noise were what kept me from being happy; then I told her about everything that had happened to me from the moment I left the house in the morning until my arrival at her place. Confused, she asked me, “Did you say Mr. Ha’el?”

  “That’s right. My mother’s going to marry Mr. Ha’el, that man who is now one of the closest people to the Leader.”

  “Do you realize what you’re saying?”

  “I know exactly what I’m saying. I was just over at my mother’s place and she told me the two of them are going to get married on Wednesday, in just three days, on the Leader’s twentieth anniversary. Mr. Ha’el wants to make a good impression on the Leader by getting married on the day of his anniversary.”

  “How did she meet him?”

  “She talked about female arrangements.”

  “That Mr. Ha’el is a strange one. He knows for sure that you’re her son and that they hate you very much. I once overheard somebody say that the only reason you’re still alive is because you’re a well-known writer. Otherwise they would have got rid of you. You hate them as well, so tell me, what kind of a marriage is this? And don’t tell me you’re going!”

  “My mother says she’s still a young woman, that she deserves to get married. Besides, her friend who is the wife of the director of Mr. Ha’el’s office arranged the whole thing. Don’t ask me to answer questions like that. I don’t know how to respond.”

  “You don’t know how to respond to me about whether or not you’re going to the wedding?”

  “I’ll answer you about that of course. She asked me to come because she wants me there by her side. Without me she’d feel ashamed. Do you want to come with me? We’ll have fun.”

  She stared hard at me for a long time in order to figure out whether I was serious. She didn’t completely believe what I said, and that was justified; I was in disbelief myself. Her severe response caused me to doubt the soundness of my own calm. Was I unaware of some danger aimed right at me? Should I have been angry or afraid? With a sure tongue she said, “I see you’re calm and at peace.”

  “Actually, I am calm and at peace.”

  “Aren’t you afraid they might be planning some kind of a trap for you?”

  “Like what? Tell me, please.”

  She was upset with me. She got out of the tub as water dripped from her shimmering body. She didn’t pick up a towel and try to cover up her nudity as she usually would when she was upset. I loved her ass, which shook abruptly as water flew from it. When she turned back to glance at me before leaving the bathroom she caught me staring at her from behind. She stopped at the bathroom door, spun around and leaned one hand against the wall, wrapped the other one around her waist and shifted all her weight to one leg as she bent the other one and placed it on her toes—it was a special and amazing position. Her anger turned into a sly smile even as water dripped from her pubic hair. Slowly, enunciating carefully, she asked, “Can we talk about this outside the bathroom, please?”

  “Where?”

  “The living room.”

  “Will you stand like that out there, too? You’re unbelievable in that pose.”

  She laughed softly, leaning her head to one side and hiding her face behind her raised forearm. Her anger dissipated. No matter what, in both moods, Lama is gorgeous.

  “All right, I’ll follow you,” I told her, getting up out of the tub.

  I didn’t want to ruin her couch so I dried off bit by bit, running the towel quickly over my body, which holds more water than Lama’s because of my enormity and the hair that blankets me. When I emerged from the bathroom I found her sitting on the couch, one knee bent up next to her as she rested her head against the edge of the couch. The beautiful thing about Lama is that she isn’t bashful about being naked around me. She is completely open and reveals every part of herself to me. I sat down on the end of the couch she left empty for me and rested my arm and head the way she had done. I noticed a thin layer of tears in her eyes, which meant that she was seriously distressed and anxious, so I decided not to mess with her.

  “Do you have any idea that they’re ganging up on you to win you over?” she asked. “Now they’re intermarrying to get to you. They want you back in their clutches once and for all.”

  “But I’ve been silent all these years. I’m not a threat to them.”

  “Bullshit. They don’t want you to be silent. They want you to talk, only in a way that benefits them. They want you on their side.”

  “They have scores of people like me who live to go with their flow. They don’t need any more.”

  “On the contrary. They’re particularly interested in you because you’re outside the current. They don’t want anyone to be disconnected. You must, in their view, join them and write praise for the Leader.”

  “So they forced Mr. Ha’el into marrying my mother, all because of me?”

  “And they’ll do even more than that.”

  I was silent and tried to think. Was it possible Lama was right? And what about my mother? She told me her marriage to Ha’el was in my interest because I would be able to go back to work.

  “My mother wants me to write a new novel,” I told Lama. “She said she would pay me two thousand dollars if I did.”

  “When did she tell you this?”

  “Today.”

  “Don’t rule out the possibility that Mr. Ha’el is behind it. Now they want you to write. The question is, what are you going to write?”

  “Why should I believe what you’re saying?”

  “I beg you to believe it because I’m afraid for you. They’re going to end you, but with silk gloves. Or by intermarriage.”

  “So what should I do, in your opinion?”

  “Wish Ratiba Hanim happiness in marriage and stay far, far away.”

  “But how? She’s my mother. I have to be with her, at least on her wedding night.”

  She angled her neck and started stroking the back of her head, which was her custom whenever she was thinking about something. Looking her up and down I found her very attractive. Had it not been for the fact that we were discussing a serious matter I might have got up and had my way with her right then and there. I quickly looked up at the ceiling. I didn’t want her to catch me—we were discussing my reputation, after all—staring at her
crotch. She continued staring right back at me without flinching. She wasn’t interested in what I was looking at, saying instead, “All right, we’ll go to the wedding together on Wednesday. I want to go with you and find out what their intentions are exactly. I want to be there when they kiss your ass and try to get closer to you.”

  “My mother’s going to jump for joy when she sees you coming.”

  “I’ll buy her something nice.”

  “But how are we going to act, do you think, the day after the wedding? On the one hand, I don’t want to stop seeing my mother, but on the other hand I don’t want to hang out with Mr. Ha’el either.”

  “Once you’ve discovered their true intentions, you can behave however you want. You know better than I do how to deal with Mr. Ha’el and his kind. Tell me, how would you react if the situation really was the way I described it?”

  “I’d keep on hating them. I’d wait for a better opportunity to break the silence and return to writing.”

  “I always hoped you would start writing again.”

  “In times like these, silence is wisdom.”

  “Silence is wisdom when talk is praise for the Leader,” Lama said.

  “Talk has many faces, if you like, one for praising the Leader and another for praising the Truth.”