Friendly Fire

by Alaa Al Aswany

  We never asked because we loved Nagi and when we loved someone it was as though they were us, as though it were us that were standing tall before the Frère. We were all Nagi. We weren’t afraid and we weren’t beaten (even though in fact we were beaten, daily) and we would crowd around him in the playground, begging him to play with us and competing at explaining the game to him—and how proud the one who made him smile! Nagi was happy and we were happy with him, until that day.

  The Frère was collecting the assignment books as usual and Nagi stood up in front of him and said in his confident voice, “I’m sorry, I forgot mine at home.” The Frère’s face twitched. Then he moved his lips as though making his mind up about something and said, “Put your hand out!”

  But Nagi didn’t put his hand out and didn’t budge and the Frère’s voice rose terrifyingly as he shouted, “Put your hand out!”

  Nagi remains as unmoving as a rock, and we rush up to him to support him from behind with our little trembling hands, but the Frère is bellowing and raises his hand high in the air and brings it down on Nagi’s face, at which we all scream, but we don’t make any noise and it’s clear that everything we think we’ve done didn’t happen because Nagi’s face reddens and he shouts, “Hitting is not allowed!”—at which the Frère’s voice roars out like thunder as he cries, “Out, you wretch! I’ll show you how to behave!”

  Short, hurried, shaky footsteps are followed by long, resolute, merciless footsteps, and as soon as they have left classroom we go crazy, jumping up from our places and running and screaming a hundred times, as though to make the Frère hear, “Hitting is not allowed!” while a multitude of scenarios jostle before our eyes, all of which end with the Frère lying on the ground, the blood running from his face and Nagi next to him, his chest swollen with pride and his hands on hips, like the triumphant hero of an adventure movie.

  The Frère returned alone and set about collecting the books again, but in vain. What had happened had happened and something had changed and student after student turned out to have forgotten his assignment book, but the Frère didn’t strike any of them; he made an angry gesture with his hand, averted his face, and then moved on as though he could have struck the boy but was fed up with everything. But you were lying, Teacher; you had been broken, and we saw you then with new eyes and we found you to be ordinary, and if we’d stripped you of your friar’s robe, you would have been just like anybody else on the street.

  The day passed and anxiety over Nagi gnawed at us. At home in the evening, we told what had happened. Our mothers didn’t give us their full attention and our fathers were disturbed by the idea of rebellion so they sought to divert us. Next morning, Nagi was back. He stood with us in the lineup and we crowded round him with a thousand questions, but he didn’t answer, he just smiled and kept silent. His face was neither pale nor miserable. Nor was it, however, his face of yesterday. The period started, Nagi sat down, and the Frère started explaining the lesson as usual. After a little while, as though by agreement, the Frère called Nagi from his place and the two of them stood facing us. In threatening tones, the Frère said, “I’m going to the principal’s office for a few minutes and Nagi will be in charge. Anyone whose name Nagi writes down gets ten strokes of the cane!”

  Nagi stands over us, his hands clasped behind his back, his eyes widening as he scans us slowly, searching for any infraction. All the boys play it safe, arms folded in front of them and heads lowered in submission as they read, and they dart warning glances at me, as if to say, “Everything’s changed. Play it safe,” but I don’t play it safe. Why would I need to be safe from Nagi when I’m his friend?

  I suddenly find myself calling out, “Nagi!” as though I were trying to keep him with me, to cling on to him. But he pushes me violently away and then turns to the blackboard and writes my name, and the Frère comes and he gives me ten strokes with the cane in front of the class.

  Here I am. Tears wet my face, my hand stings, and I turn to Nagi, who stands forever next to the Frère. I keep looking at him. Maybe he will cover his gaze just once.

  Why, Sayed? (A Question)

  WHY, MY DEAR, GOOD SAYED ABD EL-TAWWAB? It wasn’t the first time, and what happened was no surprise to you. Not to mention that the young man was polite and pleasant and you were the one who made a play for him. When you saw him get off the bus in front of the museum, his camera over his shoulder, his quiet demeanor appealed to you. He wasn’t trying to attract attention like the others. You, Sayed, were the one who approached him and started a conversation by saying hello and telling him you were an Egyptian boy who would like to make his acquaintance. His blue eyes widened in surprise. Then his lips parted in a welcoming smile that was not without a certain suspicion, which you quickly dispelled with your warm, fluent speech. Weren’t you happy with him in the restaurant? You had a long, sentimental talk, and he invited you to have a drink with him after dinner and like an old friend opened his heart to you, telling you that he worked in a hospital in Boston, while you told him about your diploma in commerce. When you calculated your salary for him in dollars, he couldn’t believe it at first and when you had convinced him, he laughed so long you couldn’t help yourself and you laughed too.

  If it’s what the elevator operator at the hotel said to you, he is, when it comes down to it, nothing but a servant, and what do you, Sayed, care what servants say about you? And anyway, what happened in the room? The young man told you how attached he was to his mother and showed you her photo and when you told him she looked like your aunt, he said to you, laughing, that you must really be relatives then. He was slightly drunk but the alcohol only made him more agreeable. And when you asked him, Sayed, did he hesitate? Did he not hasten to stuff the hundred-dollar bill into your pocket? And after it was over—and, as you know well, Sayed, it isn’t always so—he wasn’t rude and insensitive, he remained tactful with you to the end. You have his address in Boston on you now and, who knows, maybe you’ll visit him there one day. And here you are now, Sayed, sitting and having breakfast at the Meridien, eating and drinking like a king, and all you have to do is to put the check on Room No. 511 and in half an hour the banks will be open and you’ll go to the nearest one, to any bank that will change the hundred dollars while you wait. So what’s the problem? Why, Sayed, are you all of a sudden crying now, like a child?

  Games

  ALL OF US IN FIFTH ELEMENTARY used to look forward to gym class with total impatience. On Tuesday mornings, we’d remove our school uniforms and put on our gym clothes—“white shorts, white undershirt, and tennis shoes.” Miss Souad, the gym teacher, would gather us in the playground and we’d stand in three parallel lines and do exercises for a quarter of an hour. Then we’d play ball for the rest of the period.

  Our schoolmate Muhammad el-Dawakhli did not join us for gym because he was extremely fat. With his huge body, his flabby belly, and his large buttocks, he couldn’t get into the shorts like us or lie on his back and raise his legs in the air as we did in exercises. He couldn’t even play ball with us—he sweated too much and ran out of breath at the slightest effort. From this an essentially unspoken agreement developed by which Miss Souad ignored el-Dawakhli completely and he spent the gym period sitting on the steps that led up to the classrooms. There he would sit, wearing his school clothes of navy jacket and long gray pants, observing us in silence. We, on the other hand, no sooner had Miss Souad thrown us the inflatable ball with its black and white squares, would as one let out a loud cry of “Heeeeeey!” snatch up the ball, and plunge into a fierce discussion which would last until we had reached a suitable division into two teams. The shared goal would be marked out with two bricks and as soon as play started we would forget everything, running with the ball, dodging, scoring goals, and imitating the famous players we saw on television: the moment one of us scored a goal, his teammates would rush up to him and kiss him and congratulate him, while he’d fall to the ground and thank God for the goal or run off raising his hands toward the trees tha
t lined either side of the playground, pretending that they were the stands, crammed with the roaring crowd.

  At such moments, we would forget el-Dawakhli completely. We would think of him only if there was a dispute over some play, when we would turn to him in his distant seat and cry excitedly, “Was that a goal, Dawakhli?”

  When this happened, el-Dawakhli would stand up, his plump face taking on a serious mien, hurry over to us, stretch out his arm in the direction of the play, and say, panting, “The ball came from here. So it’s a goal, a hundred percent.”

  Having thus delivered himself of his conclusive decision and performed his duty, he’d return to the stands, sit down, and continue watching.

  Now, when I think back, I realize how much el-Dawakhli must have longed to play with us and how much he must have wished he had a small, ordinary body like ours, instead of his comically fat one. But we were young, too young to understand. We thought of him as a huge, odd creature made to incite laughter and entertain, just like the elephants and bears that we went to the circus to see. Indeed, as far as we were concerned, making fun of el-Dawakhli was a temptation we could never resist. We were always insulting him for being so obese, to the extent even that some of the boys became veritable experts at getting a rise out of him. One might, for example, get up from his desk in the minutes between one class and the next with a stupid, quarrelsome expression on his face, rush over to where el-Dawakhli was sitting, and pounce on him—just like that, for no reason and without saying a word—giving him a hard slap on the back of his neck, and then running; or snatch a copy book or a pen from him; or—and this was the very least that duty demanded—stand at a safe distance in front of him and start making fun of him in a loud voice, saying, for example, “Hey, Dawakhli you bullock, what makes you so fat? What do they feed you at home, you mule, you pig?” and keep it up until the rest of the boys were howling with laughter

  And el-Dawakhli would submit to these attacks, aware that he was powerless to catch his assailant if he chased him and knowing from experience that resistance only increased their fury. He would, therefore, remain seated, saying nothing, his body stuffed behind the desk, pretending that he hadn’t heard, or sometimes with an abject, pale, wan smile on his face that pleaded with his assailant to desist. When one of them slapped him and ran, el-Dawakhli would turn toward us, the ones who were laughing, his face still clouded with the effect of the blow, and then sigh and shake his head as though to ask us in amazement, “What’s wrong with that boy?”

  Despite all of which, el-Dawakhli made every effort to ingratiate himself with us. He’d willingly lend us anything as soon as we asked for it. He’d give us a sandwich or an exercise book or even a pen during an exam, should one of us have forgotten his, and on his own initiative he’d phone any student who was absent and dictate what he’d missed to him. The moment that el-Dawakhli saw you in the playground, he’d start talking to you about something that you were interested in—the increase in the school fees, or how difficult geography was—as though to distract your attention from his person, or he’d take you by the hand and pull you aside and bend over and whisper in the accents of one imparting an important secret that he’d heard that the Arabic teacher was going to call a pop quiz tomorrow, so you’d better get ready; then he’d pat you affectionately on the shoulder and move away.

  El-Dawakhli did this so that we’d like him, or, at the least, so that his niceness to us would shame us into not hurting him any more, but all his efforts were in vain. We’d listen to his exciting news, accept his help, and thank him, but our exchanges with him remained tense and surrounded by danger, coming at a certain point to teeter on the edge of embarrassment and then suddenly flipping us back into our mockery and insults.

  Miss Souad disappeared and we heard that she’d been transferred to another school. In her place they brought Mr. Hamid, who was extremely tall, with piercing wide eyes and a frowning face, and whose long thin cane with the pointed end that stung our backs and our hands if we slacked off a little during the exercises never left his hand. He was a new teacher, and severe, and, as soon as he saw el-Dawakhli sitting on the steps in his school uniform, he called him over and asked him why he wasn’t wearing his gym clothes. El-Dawakhli hung his head and didn’t answer, and the teacher warned him that he’d better turn up in his uniform the next time.

  In the playground, we surrounded el-Dawakhli and asked him about it and he told us very plainly that he’d never wear gym clothes. He asserted that students who had special ‘circumstances’ such as his own were forbidden to wear gym clothes, and everyone knew that.

  Despite el-Dawakhli’s assertion, something about his voice and his eyes made us feel that he was in a tight spot and didn’t know what to do. The next time we had gym, we took our places in the lines in readiness for the exercises. We looked around for el-Dawakhli but couldn’t find him, and he wasn’t sitting on the steps as he usually did. Our eyes scanned the whole playground until we discovered him: he was there, hiding behind the large tree next to the cafeteria. He had concealed his body behind the huge trunk, his head peering round it to watch what was going on, very like an ostrich trying to disappear. But in vain: the teacher spotted him and yelled out his name, so el-Dawakhli hurried over to him. The teacher forestalled him by saying in a threatening voice, “Did you bring your gym clothes?”

  El-Dawakhli was silent for a moment. Then, to our astonishment, he nodded his head, and the teacher said, “Go and get changed and come back here.”

  A murmur ran through the boys. This was the bombshell of the season. El-Dawakhli wearing shorts and gym clothes? We were going to die of laughter at the sight and lay into him with mockery and teasing until he could take no more. We were possessed by an overweening curiosity and a powerful, malign desire of the sort that takes over the people watching a wrestling match. We wanted at that moment to harm and hurt and enjoy. Our eyes hung on the steps, on which, after a moment, el-Dawakhli would reappear. We were restless with eagerness, like young wild animals smacking their lips in anticipation of the prey. We didn’t have to wait long. There was el-Dawakhli coming down the stairs looking much stranger than we’d even imagined. The gym shirt made his breasts stick out like a woman’s and his big belly hung down and shook this way and that. The shining whiteness of his fat thighs, and his incredible buttocks, divided by the shorts into two closely spaced segments of equal size, one rising while the other fell, were there for all to see.

  A gale of laughter rang out. All of us were consumed with hilarity—even the teacher, whose lips parted in a wide grin. We began clapping, whistling, and shouting, “El-Dawakhli!” El-Dawakhli had to cross the playground to get to us but we couldn’t contain our impatience and rushed over to him and formed a circle around him, laughing and applauding. El-Dawakhli started behaving in a strange way. He started laughing and pretending that he couldn’t stop himself. Then he started to walk doubled over so as to exaggerate the way his buttocks stuck out, and to pat his belly. He’d made up his mind to make himself as much of a laughingstock as he could and this was his way of getting out of the situation, as though telling us, “See? I’m so funny I make even myself laugh. What more do you want?”

  This approach displeased us somewhat. El-Dawakhli’s artificial laughter diluted the strength of our mockery. Without his pain and anger our joy was incomplete, and our wicked impulse drove us imperiously on to the end, as though we were possessed by demons; we didn’t even pay attention to the teacher calling us from behind to come back. We went up to el-Dawakhli and set about assiduously abusing him, more than one falling on him and slapping him and pulling him. At that instant, we were no longer laughing at his appearance; we were now laughing simply to cause him pain, so that we could break that shell of indifference under which he hid his sorrow. And el-Dawakhli would not give in. He went on faking his laugh and walking doubled over, but we increased the attack further and further until one of us said something about him suckling babies with his breasts and we burst int
o even greater laughter. It was only at that point that el-Dawakhli stopped walking and started flinging his arms about violently in an attempt to hit us. All his blows went wide, however, and he fastened his eyes on us and opened his mouth to say something. Then his lips quivered and he burst into tears.

  Boxer Puppies, All Colors

  “FAWWAZ HUSSEIN” IS THE NAME he’ll whisper to you, introducing himself, and when you see him you’re sure to find him lovable, for Fawwaz Hussein is likeable. He is also a bit of a dandy, as witnessed by his Vaseline-slicked hair and his forelock, in the style of Anwar Wagdi, not to mention the broad leather belt that encircles his huge paunch and at whose midpoint is a brass buckle on which “LOVE” is written in English, and, finally, the shiny shoes with the pointed tips and wedge heels that Fawwaz favors above all other kinds. Though all these things went out of fashion twenty years ago, when Fawwaz was a young man, he still takes good care of them and will sometimes be overcome by a sense of how smart they are and you’ll catch him contemplating in an admiring and self-satisfied way, as he talks to you, the buckle on his belt or the tips of his shoes. Fawwaz Hussein is also polite, so polite that he makes one feel embarrassed. He veritably drips politeness. As soon as he sees you, he runs over to shake your hand, bowing so deeply before you that his back forms a bow, as though there’s nothing he’d love more in the world than for his huge body to shrink and dwindle, out of respect for your honorable presence. When he talks to you, he whispers, lowers his eyes, and forms his thick lips into an “O,” puckering them up till they look like the beak of a tiny, innocent bird. Why not then love Fawwaz?