A Shimmering Red Fish

by Youssef Fadel

  He didn’t find her in the hospital, and he wouldn’t have recognized her even if she were to be found in one of its rooms. She remained anonymous among all the other nobodies every single time he came looking for her. An unknown surrounded by faceless beings. After eleven days, he found her at the door to the workshop. That’s right—that’s how things go when you want them to get better. He remembers her after she came back from the hospital, how she stood in the workshop doorway, a white veil covering her head and face. He stood watching her from a distance. He remembers that he hadn’t stopped thinking about her for those eleven days he had spent looking for her in the hospital wards, as if she had occupied his entire body. He walked toward her and saw that she hadn’t completely healed yet and wondered why she had left the hospital without having fully healed. She had come this far, and that was what was important. They were the worst two weeks of his life. The man believes that now. The man believes that the two weeks that followed her return were the worst. He watched Farah sitting, hopelessly playing with her fingers or lying down, every once in a while letting out a soft moan like a deep sigh, as if trying to console herself. He watched his hands as they covered up the burns on her face with ointments she brought with her from the hospital. Or maybe they were the best of days! He brought her hot food from the café or from his mother’s house, hoping she wouldn’t get up so he could stay up all night taking care of her, attending to her every moan, fulfilling her every request, along with those things she hadn’t asked for. Tears came to his eyes whenever he saw her fingers searching out his hand, and when they found it, they clung to it like a drowning person holding on for dear life. Her pain gave him new life and lit an additional spark of love in his soul. Truly the best two weeks. And all the while he hoped she wouldn’t get up so he could continue to lean over her, and examine her face through the transparent veil as she smiled at him with a hidden half-acknowledgment of something beautiful he hadn’t done. Every moan, no matter how faint, brought her closer to him and him closer to her. Pain was the bridge that led to her. Her beautiful, silent pain. He also recalls her prominent collarbone and how he would become erect when he looked at the thin white bones under the rays of light coming in through the window, and at the spatters of sulfuric acid that had splashed black and brown spots all over her fine skin. Her arms, folded over her lightly shaking belly, were just as white, with the same spots on them. Was she going to get up? He hoped she wouldn’t so his gaze could roam freely over her and his eyes could cheerfully take in their fill of her body’s hidden maps—perhaps what he was seeing on her body were the delicate drawings he had etched in the mosque’s wooden roof. Her pain was the mountain he scaled so he could see the vastness of his love for that garden of calm in which Farah lay. Its flowers blew to and fro in a gentle breeze that rose from an unseen stream. They were hidden together under a shady, luxuriant elm, far from anyone else. This dove that glided up above built its nest in his garden. But she did get up. One morning she got up. He was the one hoping she wouldn’t get up so that she wouldn’t disappear again. But this time she had come to stay. He helped her stand up, and when she expressed a desire to sit in the sun in the workshop doorway, he led her there and helped her sit down. And as she sat there sunning herself, he sat down next to her. She had her hands on her knees. He didn’t know what to do with his hands. His mind raced. She asked him if he had been waiting for her. He replied that he had searched for her in all the hospitals but hadn’t found her. But had he been waiting for her? Yes, he had been waiting for her. She placed her hand on his and squeezed it with her thin fingers, holding on and squeezing hard. The mosque was in front of them with its green roof tiles. Its minaret up there in all its splendor. Complete. Its zellij tiles reflected the sun’s glistening rays. Did Farah still love to sing? Would the sound of Fairouz’s voice be sweeter coming from underneath the white veil? Perhaps she had guessed what he was thinking about, and perhaps right then she remembered the song she had sung in the mosque. She removed her veil, and her voice emerged meekly, completely inaudible.

  They remained standing and talking next to their gray car for quite some time. Pistols at their sides and malice in their eyes. Their eyes weren’t black. They were like wildcat eyes—somewhere between yellow and brown. Their voices scratched like wildcat claws; claws just the right size for hunting mice. The car was parked ten meters away. Two gendarmes in full uniform were searching the area with all of their senses—smell, touch, hearing, and sight—with the audacity and confidence that their pistols gave them and the official appearance their bearing granted them. The man had been watching the car ever since it had appeared on the horizon. He might have been following its movement even before it appeared, just from the sound, then watched as it crossed the roadway that ran alongside the train tracks until it came to a stop. He invited them to sit down. One of them sat on the box, but the one with the epaulettes on his shoulders remained standing. The man offered him the wicker chair he was sitting in. The mother brought two cups of tea and freshly baked bread with butter, along with a towel for them to wipe their hands with when they were finished eating. They were here on a mission and wouldn’t stay longer than necessary. They wiped their hands on the towel and got up from where they were sitting. Their work didn’t allow them to sit. Since dawn, they’d been tracking thieves. Thieves become more numerous in the days leading up to the holidays. The man knew they weren’t tracking cattle thieves. However, there was nothing to keep them from talking about thieves if talking about thieves made them happy. The man knew that the cistern guard wasn’t tracking a rabbit, but there was nothing to keep him from talking about rabbits if that was what made him happy.

  The man said he hadn’t seen any thieves.

  They appeared unconvinced by what the man said. That was part of their job. They knew he had woken up at three and sat down in this chair at quarter after three, right?

  Had he heard gunshots during the night?

  He replied that he hadn’t heard gunshots.

  At dawn?

  Nor at dawn.

  Had he seen a herd walking along the tracks?

  He hadn’t seen a herd walking along the tracks.

  A herd of cows.

  He hadn’t seen a herd of cows walking along the tracks.

  They remained standing there. They still had some time. The two gendarmes drank another cup of tea, ate some more bread and butter, wiped their hands on the towel, and said that thieves become more numerous in the days leading up to the holidays.

  The man repeated that thieves become more numerous in the days leading up to the holidays.

  “Keep your eyes open.”

  The man said he’d keep his eyes open.

  “If a cow shows up walking along the track . . .”

  He said that if that happened, he’d inform the gendarmes, as he always does, because he loves the gendarmes, and always wishes them success in what they do.

  “Salam alaykum. May peace be upon you.”

  “To you as well.”

  17

  A New Year’s Present

  Sitting on the rocks watching the ships at sea in front of me, I hadn’t imagined that I’d meet her again. But Farah was standing right there in front of me, inside the workshop. All the day’s worries disappeared. I wasn’t sure right then what was different about her face. That was because I hadn’t looked closely at her, cautious as I was, scared, first and foremost, that it wasn’t her, and then scared that if it was her, she’d become frightened and turn to run away. As I walked slowly toward her, my blood pumped faster as if my heart had been turned up a notch. I could practically hear its thunderous thumps beating violently in my ears. Her shoes were green. Her white legs were bare and she moved her small suitcase from one hand to the other. On her chest was a swallow made of black glass that moved to the rhythm of her chest’s light trembling so that it looked as if it were flying around this small green garden with vibrantly colored butterflies fluttering about. There was a look of worry on
her face, or it might have been distress, or the beginning of a question, or a certain pallor. Farah looked more faded than she had before. She shivered because of the cold. I don’t like it when the cold comes unannounced. I didn’t think about whether she was hungry or not. That question didn’t even enter my mind. I extended a hand toward her in an attempt to show her that it was neither nervous nor surprised. It didn’t show the same excitement and agitation that was on my face. I inquired about her health and made a joke about some nonsense that made her laugh and blush. Then I swore that I had thought of her just that morning when I woke up. I swear to God! I had to add that I had seen her in a dream wearing the same green dress, and why not? Perhaps I had seen her and forgotten. I no longer had anything else to think about other than making her laugh and spending the day searching for words that would touch her in some way, that would allow me to forget I had been missing her for at least two months. Now, when I heard her say she was hungry and would love to eat some little sardine balls with olives and lemon, I didn’t say a thing. Would I be able to find conditions favorable to fulfilling such a small desire? What use was speaking? I also wondered whether I should grab her hand, knowing that I wouldn’t, as if I were seeing her for the first time. That’s why I couldn’t find the right thing to say. Should I ask her about her friend Naima? Should I talk to her about the different types of wood I know about? What’s a girl to do with a knowledge of different types of wood? I didn’t have any other way to bring her close to me. I drew some squares on a piece of paper and began to explain what they meant, explaining the meanings of other squares I didn’t draw as well. The square is neither a beginning nor an ending. The dot is the beginning. A hailstone. A drop of water. A bird’s call. A knock on the door. All of them are dots that humans did not come up with. They existed before humans, and they’ll exist after humans are gone. She looked at the piece of paper. She may have been trying to understand. It was a good start. I lit a cigarette and blew the smoke out. I was feeling better. There was still plenty of time. I saw her lean toward the drawing as if she were following the corridors I had drawn in my imagination. Should I grab her hand now? On the roof above our heads, seagulls walked around. The female usually walks with heavy steps. The male’s walk is always rushed. Their walk turned into a noisy scamper. The male was chasing the female above our heads. A loud clamor. Like a full tribe of mice. Yet they were nothing more than two seagulls who couldn’t wait. Two seagulls making all of this racket! I told her I knew a shop where they sold this kind of food. I didn’t grab her hand.

  18

  My sister Khadija continued to worry about her hair falling out up until the day she left home, saying with neither joy nor disappointment, “Look, look. My hair isn’t falling out anymore!” The man named Omar, or Hassan, or Hussein came late one afternoon and asked for her hand, all on his own, without any family or friends or conditions. How could he have conditions when he didn’t even possess enough for his own dinner, having nothing for her or for himself? All he possessed were his three useless names. A man currently out of work (and who had never worked a day in his life), living in a dark, cramped, empty room with a ceiling and walls that were crumbling because of the dampness. There was a patched blanket and a table wobbling on three legs. This is what Mother and I said to her: “Khadija, this man isn’t suitable for you. You’ll die from the cold before the end of winter.” She remained silent, and in the end said that she wasn’t thinking of herself. We didn’t understand what she was getting at. Who was she thinking about, then? In any case, she talked so little in the last few days before she left that we had to remain optimistic. She fattened up a little—her chest filled out and her buttocks plumped up—as if she were being nourished by her illusions, as if it were her special way of getting ready for marriage. She didn’t show any signs of joy or sadness. On either side of her eyes and above her upper lip an intricate web of fine wrinkles appeared that gave her face a sort of sternness. Khadija had grown old and gray after so much waiting. Like a fruit that had over-ripened before being picked, but she was neither delighted nor pained. Rather, she had simply ripened quickly, so quickly she had almost rotted. She could be forgiven for that. Perhaps she was right.

  I didn’t find her in the room she rented after leaving us. I finally found her in the early afternoon on one of the roofs. Mother had been wondering what had happened to her daughter ever since she left in mid-November. She thought of her as she sat in front of the sewing machine. She thought of her as she sat at the dining table. She thought of her all the time. Anxiously, she wondered about the hand her daughter had been dealt. I didn’t find her in the second room either. The entrance to the house had no door, like the alley. The hallway was dark. I tripped as soon as I stepped in. Still, I stepped in and was immediately surrounded by a rotting smell, rancid enough to make your eyes water. I went up some narrow stairs that led to a long hallway where some nearly naked children less than a year old were playing, wrapped in rags that revealed more than they covered up. An obese woman was hunched over a tin washbasin squeezing her laundry, moving her lips without making a sound, as if speaking to her unhuman inflated chest. The woman was completely soaked; behind her there were clothes dripping on the line. The naked children jumped and pranced all around her. I asked her about the room where Khadija lived. She didn’t respond. She contented herself with a meaningless look, as if she were looking at the wall. She went back to her washing. I tried again, practically screaming, “Khadija! Khadija! I’m asking about my sister Khadija!” The obese woman didn’t lift her head this time either. Instead, a man with angry eyes appeared in the downstairs hallway, in the entryway I had just passed through without seeing him. He hit the wall with his cane and yelled that the woman was mute. I looked down at him from the top of the stairs. I could only see the white turban covering the top of his head and his cane raised up toward me. “The woman is mute. Mute!” His cane was the only thing that remained clear in my mind. What he told me about Khadija and her husband when I went down caused the blood to go to my head. Blood, anger, and tears. I told myself that I was the cause of what had happened to my sister. If her husband beat her, it was because no one had been asking about her. No one had asked about her since she went off with him. And where were they now? Who knows where they went. To another alley. To another hell. Her husband never paid the rent he promised to pay. How could he pay a single day’s rent when he didn’t work? Then he’d come home drunk every night and beat her, after which he’d throw her out to spend the rest of the night in the hall or on the stairs. The man was wearing two heavy wool djellabas. Standing in front of the house and boiling with the same anger I was, he hit the stone-hard ground of the alley with his cane as if he were smashing the head of the criminal, my sister’s husband. “If he’s going to end up killing her, let him do it someplace else . . .” I didn’t hear the last part of what he said because I was unconsciously repeating that I was going to kill him—knowing that I wouldn’t—or that we would kill him, Kika and I. We wouldn’t hesitate to slit his throat from ear to ear, Kika and I. Together we could slaughter an elephant. Especially Kika, because he happily slaughters the holiday sheep. But Kika isn’t my friend anymore. I don’t know what he’s been up to ever since Farah and I left him behind in the street.

  The third room where I found my sister Khadija resembled a neglected wooden box on one of the rooftops. A seven- or eight-year-old girl led me to the building’s entrance, pointed to the roof, and disappeared. No smoke. No food smells. No running water. No clothesline indicating that there was any life on this roof. Just a narrow open door at the end of the stairs that I didn’t doubt for a moment led to the wooden cube Khadija called her room. As soon as I moved toward the door, the body of her husband Omar, or Hassan, or Hussein got in my way, rushing toward me as if a supernatural force had thrown him out of the room. Naked as the day his mother had given birth to him, enraged and yelling that Khadija had sucked him dry. Squeezed him. Sucked his blood. Sucked his last drop of wat
er. I was bumped back to the top of the stairs. “This woman is never satisfied. Her hole always wants it. She loves it all the time—day and night, morning and evening, all the time. She loves it in every position—standing or sitting, kneeling or lying down, on her back or on her belly, in every position.” Then he headed toward me, forgetting that he was naked, as if I were someone with whom the secrets of the wooden room could be shared, the secrets of the room where her legs are always pointed up toward the sky. “And even afterward she stays there in bed rolling around like a cat.” I still wondered whether he had seen me. Had he seen me and recognized me? Right then, Khadija appeared in the doorway, also naked. Her breasts hung down like two dried eggplants. Wrung out. Black. Some birds flew off over our heads. Khadija went back into the room and threw on something so skimpy it didn’t cover a thing. Had she changed? She was the same Khadija, except for some faded bruises on her forehead. Perhaps she had gotten a bit fatter. And her skin had darkened a little. As for her husband Omar, or Hassan, or Hussein, the way he was standing was ridiculous. His penis looked funny too, hanging like a small intestine with green, dimple-like spots all over it. They might actually have been dimples. His testicles hung like two dried figs. How could my sister feel any passion for this sickly, pale body? And what could he possibly want with her breasts that hung like two droopy eggplants? What was it that attracted them to one another? They didn’t make me angry anymore. They looked funny. The scene was completely ridiculous. I went into the box she called her room to get Omar, or Hassan, or Hussein something to cover himself with. However, because of the awful, stomach-turning stench, I came back out before I had a chance to finish examining the few things that were in there. A room with no windows. Empty, with practically no furniture. It smelled of sleep, cheap liquor, sweat, semen, and whatever other foul odors come out of a body. I asked Khadija if she wanted to come back home with me. Omar, or Hassan, or Hussein seemed happy with this suggestion. He yelled gleefully, “Take her, take her!” as his body shook with delight. “Take her, take her! Free me from her!”