Father says: “Put a piece of metal at the front and make it into a half sole.”
“Listen to my advice. Make a whole new sole. This is English. You don’t want to give it up.”
“Like I said, metal and a half sole.”
“Okay. Do you know how much new shoes are running these days, Bey? There’s a new American brand at Nasif for 68 piastres.”
“But it won’t last more than a couple of wearings . . . American.”
He turns towards me saying: “Have you bought your shoes for the feast?”
Father answers before I can: “We’re waiting for the big feast, Inshallah.”
He heads for the wooden newspaper rack. He unfolds today’s paper and reads through the headlines. I press my head between his stomach and the newspaper. The king in his dark glasses during a visit to the military hospital comforts the wounded returning from the front. The king of Transjordan is with him. Behind them are the two princesses, Fawziya and Faiza, in military clothes. Fawziya is a three-star general and Faiza a one-star. The shoe repairman says that we’ve become involved in a war that’s none of our business.
We keep walking to the square and then turn right and go down Qamr Street. We stop at the tailor’s shop. He sits in front of the shop on a chair with his legs stretched over another one. He’s working on repairing a jacket. Father gives him the cloth and says: “We want to make a suit for Eid out of it.” He studies the cloth, then says: “But Khalil Bey, this cloth is for curtains.”
“For curtains or not for curtains, I’m asking if you can do it.
The tailor nods his head, but he is not happy. He takes my measurements. Short trousers down to the knee. We agree that we will come back in a week to make the first patterns. We leave him and keep walking until we make it to Sakakeeny Square. We pass by the church. We go through Tourseena Street until it dead ends into al-Nuzha. Father stops in front of the villa of his friend, General Fareed. He pushes on the iron gate and I follow him up a path that cuts through a well-kept front yard. As we go up the few steps, he scrapes his shoes against the marble to announce that he is there. He knocks on an iron door. An old maid opens the door for us. He asks: “Is the bey here?” She invites him to come in.
We stop in an entrance hall crowded with furniture over a thick rug. She disappears then comes back. “Please come in, Bey.” We follow her to the guest room. Pictures of military officers, like the ones in our house, hang on the walls. A huge chandelier hangs from the ceiling. The general shows up after a while. He is wearing a robe made from colored silk and he is leaning on a cane. “Welcome, Khalil Bey. What a nice surprise!” He sits next to us and rests his cane between his legs. His face is dark and he has a sunken spot right under his neck. I know that it is from being shot. He’s wearing a white shirt under his robe with a stiff collar that the dead skin in his neck hangs over. His moustache is huge with big, woolly halves hanging down. He calls to the maid and asks her to bring the dishes of Ramadan fruit from the refrigerator. She brings three dishes on a round tray. Father gives me a dish and takes one for himself. He seems pleased with the cool dish. Mother lines up the small dishes of Ramadan fruit on the marble on top of the sideboard. She breaks up the ice into pieces with a wooden adze. She sprinkles it over the dishes.
They chat about the air raid. Father says that we were wrong to accept the truce. The general says that we had to accept it because our recent losses had been so awful. An example was the siege of Faluja. The Jewish forces kept our troops from getting water to the point that they ended up drinking their own piss. He mocked the talk between the defense minister, Haydar Pasha, and one of the other ministers that had been reported in the papers. The minister was supposed to have said to him: “Go for it, pasha. Let’s spend our Eid in Tel Aviv.” The general commented: “Yeah, right. I’ll be sure to meet you there.”
Their talk moves on to the housing crisis. Father says: “Can you imagine that some apartments require an advance of 300 pounds, non-refundable.” The general picks up a picture magazine and says: “Did you see the sentence for the killing of Amin Othman? Anwar Sadat was found innocent.” He puts the magazine down and says: “He was an officer in my unit. I didn’t like him at all. He was slippery.” I pick up the magazine. I look at the picture of Sadat. His clothes are elegant. The knot of his necktie is weirdly small. His head and beard are neatly groomed. The barber had followed the trend of shaving off all the hair around the ears.
The general calls the maid and asks her to go find his two boys. They’re big and tall. They stand in fear at the doorway. The bigger one asks: “Did you want something, sir?” He orders them to play with me. We move to another guest room. All three of us sit on a thick, dark red carpet. The maid brings in a big tray of dried fruit and nuts. I grab a hazelnut and the nutcracker. They start up a two-way card game that is too fast for me to follow. The bigger one suggests they bet on whether Abou Hebaga will win at the London Olympics at the end of the month. I ask: “Who’s Abou Hebaga?” The smaller one says: “Can anyone not know the hero of Ahly Sporting Club?” His brother backs him up: “The greatest football player in the world!”
I get up and walk around the room. I sit on a couch. It has comfortable cushions dyed in dark colors. Pictures of the boys with their father and other relatives are hanging on the wall. I get up. The two boys are lost in their game. I sneak out of the guest room and into the living room. It is dark. At one end there’s a lighted room. I move close to it. I hear the sound of Quranic recitation. I peek in with care. A sheikh wearing a turban and a flowing cloak sits cross-legged on an oriental couch. His hand is on his cheek. He recites while rocking himself to the left and right. As the verse ends, he continues the rocking silently. I go back to the living room. The big boy suggests that we play hearts.
Father appears at the door with the general behind him. I follow him outside. We leave the villa and make our way back to the house. He stops us at the house and home shop. We buy a box of small glass teacups with colored inscriptions decorating its sides. He sets it on top of the sideboard and says that they are for Eid.
The calls of the yoghurt seller float up to us. He grabs an empty, brown-colored clay pot. We go into our room and open the door to the balcony. He calls to the vendor and hands him the pot. The vendor takes out a full container from the bottom covered with white cloth. He hands it up to father.
In the distance, the voice of the crier waking people up for the pre-dawn meal echoes through the quarter: “Wake up, sleepers in the night; make your stomachs full and right!” The sound of his drumbeats comes closer. He enters our alley. His face is hidden by the darkness. He stops in front of each house and calls on the people living in them by name. A tap of the drum comes after each name. He calls out Father’s name and then mine.
Father makes a plate of fried eggs. I ask him: “Where’s Fatima?” He says, “She’s celebrating Eid.”
We have our breakfast in the living room. He brings the teapot and pours some into two of our new glasses. He adds sugar and stirs. When I pick my cup up, the base of it breaks off and hot tea spills over the table. When he takes his cup, the same thing happens. He stands up and leaves everything sitting on the table. We go to wash our hands.
He drags the desk chair out to the balcony. Lights a cigarette. He asks me to look for a paper and something to write with. I bring him my homework notebook and my pencil. He takes out a sheet of paper. I stand next to him, watching him as he writes: “Eid, O Eid, you have come back anew. Remind us of old Eids or new ones preview.” He looks out at the alley, thinking. I can tell that he is trying to write new lines to finish the famous poem like he does each Eid. I say: “Well, aren’t we going out?” He doesn’t answer. After a second, he stands up in a huff. He gets out his shaving kit and puts it on the table. I bring him a cup of water. He gets his brush wet and then rubs it on the soap.
I get my new shirt. I pull up its collar and press a stiffener into the slots for it. I put on the trousers from my new suit. The mate
rial is heavy and rough. He tells me to just wear the trousers and shirt because it is very hot. I give in, but I don’t really want to. I make sure that my lucky Quran verses are rolled up in my back trouser pocket. I can hear the noise of the children in the alley. I rush to the balcony. They are all wearing their new clothes for the Eid. The girls have bows in their hair. They’re shouting all in the same breath: “Open up those coin sacks, hand us our gifts back, O halu!” They let off firecrackers. Samir has a strip of “Italian War” brand. Its pellets hit the ground and light up.
I turn around and walk back inside. I pace back and forth for a long time until he finishes shaving. He rubs his cheeks and under his chin with an aluminum roll coated in silver foil. He leaves his razor on top of the desk. He gets up. His clothes come off. His dress shirt goes on. He buttons it. A button snaps off and falls to the ground. I pick it up. He looks around in the upper drawer of the dresser until he finds a sewing needle and some thread. He tries to get the thread through the eye of the needle but can’t. He gives them to me. I wet the end of the thread in my mouth and stick it through the eye with no problem.
He puts on the trousers that go with his white suit. He fastens his suspenders. “Bring me my shoes.” I bring him the brown shoes with the white tips. I clean them with a piece of cloth. He sits down on the edge of the bed and presses his feet into the shoes, then he ties their laces. He sits there for a second, staring at the floor. I hurry him up: “Come on now.” He stands up and puts on the suit jacket. He takes his fez off the hat rack and puts it on. He twists each end of his moustache, turning them upward with his fingers.
He closes the two glass panes of the window, and looks around for the key in the stack of scattered clothes and covers on top of the bed. He grabs the white parasol hanging on the rack. He presses on its handle to open it. A long tear appears on one side and he throws it to the side in disgust. He reminds me not to forget my English textbook and my homework notebook.
We leave the room and lock the door. Fatima is there at the door to the storage room. “Happy holidays, Sidi. Come back safe.” He gives her money for the Eid and she kisses his hand: “God preserve you, Sidi.” The late night crier faces us at the end of the alley. For the first time, I see his face in the daylight. It is tanned and covered in wrinkles. He says to father: “Happy holidays, Bey,” and Father gives him half a franc.
The grocery shop is closed. We make it to the square. Swings have been set up in front of the entrance to Husseiniya Street. We get on the tram at the front door next to the driver. I twist my neck to see the signs pasted overhead: “No Spitting.” “Do not talk to the driver.” We get off in Abbasiya Square, and get on the white tram. We get off at Ismailiya Square. Father takes a handkerchief and wipes the sweat off his face. He moves it around to the back of his neck and under his collar. He takes off the fez. He wipes off his bald spot then runs the handkerchief along the lining inside his fez. Puts the handkerchief on top of his head so its edges hang down on his forehead. He presses the fez down over it.
We go into the street and look up towards the house facing us at its end. He asks: “Do you think they’re home.” The sun is scorching and he has a watermelon under each arm. He takes off his fez and wipes away the sweat on his bald head with a handkerchief. The windows of the balcony are closed. We go back without a sound; his face looks sad.
I look hard at the wooden blinds that let you see through their narrow slats. One of them is raised just a little. I say: “If they’d gone out, they would’ve closed them.”
We stop in front of the only grocer that is open. Boxes of dried cod for Eid are stacked up in front of it. They are wide and painted snow white. Stacks of watermelon and cantaloupe melons. Some crates of grapes and figs. Father buys one oka of binati grapes and another of faiyyumi figs. He chooses the figs that have just opened up and leaves the ones that are still closed. He carries them in two bags that he clutches to his chest, one in each arm. We go back to the house. There are two cars in front of it, a Skoda and a Chrysler with a bubble shaped bonnet. The front entrance is paved with colored tiles. We go up the stairs.
The noise of the Eid festival comes from the first floor. A big family is living in two connected apartments. We keep going up to the second floor. The door overlooking the balcony is closed, but the one facing the stairwell is open. We go inside. Father plops down on the couch panting. I stand next to him. He breathes in and relaxes, removing his fez and putting it on top of a pillow in the middle of the couch. A strong breeze runs from the door that opens on to the stairwell to the guest room that connects to the veranda. Shawqi comes running out. He is about my age. He is good looking with light skin and smooth black hair. He is wearing a complete new suit. It’s a brownish color with white stripes that run lengthwise. His crepe-soled shoes are also brown. His sister Shareen runs out after him in a bright colored dress with short sleeves. Her hair is brushed back, parted in the middle, and tied with a bow behind her head. Her forehead has a deep mark from some sort of fall. They grab on to father. He hugs them and kisses them. He gives them their Eid money.
My sister Nabila walks in coming from the direction of the kitchen. She wears a dark red sleeveless dress. Her face is made up with powders and rouge. She kisses father on the cheek. “Happy holidays, papa.” He tries to kiss her back, but she moves away. “No, papa, you’ll ruin my make-up. Come on out to the veranda. There’s a nice breeze there.” Father waves at her to wait just a second. He says: “Seems like I have a touch of sunstroke or something.”
She says: “I’ll bring you some water with a drop of vinegar.”
“Give me a glass of water first.”
She calls out: “Khadra!” The new maid comes running. She is dark and taller than my sister. She has a big chest. Moves around quickly in her colored gallabiya. Her hair is tied back with a colored handkerchief that matches the gallabiya. Her feet look clean in her nice plastic flip-flops. She goes for the jugs on top of the tray sitting on the sideboard next to the radio. She takes the brass cover off one of them and pours water from it into a glass. She puts it on a small silver tray and offers it to father. She turns to me: “Would you like a drink, sir?” She hands me another glass. I gulp down the cold water with a touch of rosewater. Nabila tells her to bring a cup of water with a drop of vinegar.
Father takes off his suit coat. He throws it to the side. Nabila picks up the fez and coat. She hands them to me: “Hang them up inside.” I’m still carrying the English textbook and the notebook in my right hand. She says: “Put them on the dining table.”
I fly off to the bedroom with the fez and coat. I have to get on my tiptoes to hang the coat on one of the hooks of the coat rack. I set the fez down over it. I look up and smell something. Nabila has gathered up some mangoes from the garden and left them on the dresser. Mother offers slices of mango on a round tray made of china with colored drawings on it. It has a metal border ringing it. I like to set it on top of the rug sometimes and use it as a square with my cars, made of match boxes, moving around it. She gives Tante Dawlet a small plate with a fork and knife. She takes a slice and puts it in front of her on the plate. I wait for my turn.
I go back to the living room. Father is stretched out on his left side over the couch with his head resting on a white towel under his arm. The maid brings the water and vinegar. I take it from her and say that I know how to pour the drops from it. I lean over him. I press a finger into the vinegar water. I put it on his ear. I keep doing it until I hear a sizzling noise. Father turns over to the other side, switching the towel with him. I put drops in his other ear. He sits back up, keeping the towel against his ear. He says: “There, I’ve snapped out of it.”
Uncle Fahmi joins us in his quick step with his big belly. He leans a little to the right to check how he looks in the mirror over the sideboard. A light breeze catches the folds of his white, flowing gallabiya. “Happy holidays, Khalil Bey! The backgammon table’s ready. It’s Eid today. The winner gets a riyal.” Father smiles: “Ju
st let me catch my breath.” Uncle Fahmi drags one of the dining table chairs over and turns it around to face the couch. He lights a cigarette and gives me my Eid money. It’s a new bill worth five piastres with a picture of King Farouk inside an oval border.
Khadra brings a tray with Eid cookies, shortbread ones and ones with powdered sugar. She puts it down on a small table in front of father. Nabila hands me a small plate. I put two cookies on it. I bite into one and find it stuffed with melban, a clear nougat. Father takes a shortbread cookie. He eats it with approval. He says it’s just right because it melts as soon as he puts it in his mouth. Nabila says: “They’re handmade. Mama’s way. God rest her soul.” Father says to me: “Taste one.” I shake my head. She gets angry with me: “ ‘I’m not hungry! I’m not hungry!’ You’ll keep saying it over and over until you shrivel up and blow away.” Fahmi is smiling and looking away from her at us as he says: “Look who’s talking.” He picks up a powdered-sugar cookie. She turns towards him and shoots her eyes straight toward his stomach: “I guess I should just let myself look like a pregnant woman.”
He ignores her and talks to father instead. “Please could you tell her to get a little fatter? I brought her some peanut brittle from Al-Hamzawi to fatten her up, but she won’t go near it.” Father says to her: “He’s right. A man likes to have something to hang on to.” They laugh. Khadra comes in with cups of coffee. Father bends over to untie his shoelaces. Khadra jumps over to help him. She brings him some cloth slippers. He asks her what village she is from and he gives her Eid money. He lifts up his left leg and stretches it out on the couch under the right one. Fahmi lights a cigarette and then leans over and lights father’s too.
“Shall we play here or out on the veranda?”
Father answers: “The veranda, of course. But wait a second until my sweat is all dry.”
“It’s a person’s right in this heat to go out in a polo shirt and shorts.”
Stealth (New Directions Paperbook) Page 13