I came to as the doorbell rang. I got up slowly to open the door and when I looked through the peephole, I was taken aback for a moment. I saw the last person I expected a visit from: Dr. Karam Doss.
Chapter 13
Dr. Salah followed the psychiatrist’s advice and took his wife to dinner on Saturday at her favorite Mexican restaurant. Chris looked wonderful in her new hairdo, full makeup, and a low-cut red dress and shining brooch in the shape of a rose. The evening went perfectly: they listened to Mexican music and ate delicious spicy food. Chris drank several glasses of tequila while Salah had only one, as the doctor had advised. They whispered affectionately and she laughed happily, saying, “Thank you, darling. It’s a wonderful evening.”
Before leaving he went to the restroom and swallowed the pill. On their way home, she sat next to him in the car. There was tension in the air between them, as if they were expecting something that they couldn’t quite spell out, so they covered it up by engaging in small talk that went on and on, leading nowhere. They got home and he went to the bathroom before her, came out wearing a white cashmere robe, and lay in bed watching television until she was done with her bath. That was their time-honored ritual before lovemaking. He recalled his session with the doctor. Why did he think that what he had said was insolent? The doctor had stated the fact that he had been carrying around deep inside him, even as he tried to avoid it. Yes, indeed. He had used Chris sexually, got her addicted to him while he was implementing his plan of marrying her to get an American passport.
He thought: stop deceiving yourself. Admitting your baseness might help you. You behaved like a gigolo, exactly like those chasing old American tourists in the bars of Sao Paolo and Madrid. You’re exactly like them. The only difference is that you are educated: a gigolo with a PhD. What did you do to Chris? You ignited her physical desire with liquor and fondling, then you played hard to get; you pretended to be preoccupied, and when she persisted you asked her, like a prostitute, “How many proofs of love do you want tonight?” You toyed with her desire until she almost cried; your impudence with her increased your own desire; you kept yourself at arm’s length until she almost gave up on you and then suddenly you were all over her, burning her with pleasure until she was fully satiated and dozed off for a long time then came to, looked at you gratefully, and showered your body with kisses. Everything went as planned: you married Chris, got your green card, and afterward, American citizenship.
When he stood up to swear the pledge of allegiance to his new country, he couldn’t, even for a moment, keep Zeinab Radwan out of his thoughts. “I regret to say that you’re a coward” — that was what Zeinab had said thirty years ago, perhaps a fitting summation of his life. He was roused from his reminiscences by seeing Chris. She had come out of the bathroom wearing a white robe that she had deliberately left open, revealing a snow-white naked body. She sat next to him on the bed and clung to him. He looked at her. Her face was flushed, and she was overcome with desire. He tried to speak but discovered there was nothing more to be said. As soon as he touched her body with his fingers she threw herself at him, embracing him hard and taking his lips into her mouth. He felt the contours of her body, and her beautiful perfume filled his nostrils and he felt his blood rushing. He had an unmistakable full erection. He began to bite her breasts and knead them with his hands. For a moment he felt that he had regained his old vigor, but apprehensions suddenly assailed him and he concentrated on getting rid of them. She felt what he was going through and decided to stand by him until he achieved victory. She began to fondle him patiently and persistently. She did her best, trying several ways to keep him focused, but he wavered and gradually quivered then was out of it completely. Failure loomed like a news flash, or a bolt of lightning. She closed her eyes and moved away a little while he stretched out on his back, as if he had lost his ability to move. He began looking at the shadows cast by the soft light on the ceiling. It occurred to him that they might be depicting something that was tangible: didn’t what he was seeing now resemble a big bear and a child next to it? Or two trees next to each other, one taller than the other? He went close to her and kissed her on the head. She looked at him with tearful eyes and he was filled with pity for her. She murmured in a wounded voice, “My problem is not with sex. I’m not young and my needs diminish with age.”
He began to pat her on the head silently. She went on, “What pains me is that you no longer love me.”
“Chris!”
“You cannot deceive a woman about love.”
He sat up and began to speak slowly, as if failure had given them some respite, “In a few weeks I’ll be sixty. My life is approaching its end. At best I’ll live another ten years. When I look back on the many years that have passed, I become certain that I’ve made many wrong decisions.”
“Was I one of your wrong decisions?”
“You are the most beautiful woman I’ve known, but I only wish I could live my life over again to make different decisions. This might sound ridiculous, but I now believe that my decision to emigrate was not the right thing to do.”
“Nobody can live his life again.”
“That’s the tragedy.”
“Therapy will rid you of these thoughts.”
“I’m not going through that again. I am not going to lie on a couch to tell my life’s secrets to someone I don’t know and accept his reprimands as if I were a child who’d misbehaved. I won’t ever do that again.”
He said the last sentence loudly as he got off the bed. He turned on the light and picked up a book from the nightstand, then said as he held the doorknob before going out, “You know very well what you mean to me. But I’m going through a crisis that will not be over in the near future. I don’t want to cause you any more pain. I suggest that we separate, if only temporarily. Sorry, Chris, but I think it’s best for both of us.”
Chapter 14
“I am not so stupid as to fall for this trap. That’s all I need, ending up marrying Shaymaa. I’d be like someone fasting all day, forgoing all kinds of delicacies, and then breaking his fast eating an onion! True, she is an instructor at the College of Medicine, but she is still a peasant. I am the son of General Abd al-Qadir Haseeb, assistant director of Cairo Security; I grew up in Roxy and went to the Heliopolis Club and turned down daughters of notables. Do you expect me to end up marrying a peasant? Let her get as mad as she wants to be! To hell with her!”
That was what Tariq told himself. True, she was quite pleasant and her company delightful. True, she looked after him and cooked for him the dishes he liked. But that did not mean that he should marry her. She had to choose: either their friendship goes on as it was, or she disappears. He would give her some time to come back to her senses. He wouldn’t talk to her. Why should he talk to her? It was she who did him wrong. She got angry for no reason and talked to him improperly in a public place. She had to apologize.
He sat down to study, concentrating his thoughts away from her. As usual, before he slept, he watched a wrestling match and enjoyed a pornographic movie (actually he forced himself to have that pleasure, to prove that he had not been affected by Shaymaa). In the morning he went to school and spent the day between lecture hall and lab. He tried strenuously to banish her picture from his mind. At about three o’clock he was walking back to the dorm when he suddenly stopped and dialed her number on his cell phone. He was calling her, not to reconcile with her but to rebuke her. He would explain to her how wrong she had been. He would tell her clearly and decisively that if she wanted to go on like that, then he didn’t need her. She could go wherever she wanted. He glued his ear to the cell phone, preparing the harsh words that he would unleash on her. But the ringing went on. She didn’t pick up. Maybe she was having her nap as usual. When she woke up she would find his number and call him. Tariq ate lunch (prepared by Shaymaa), had his siesta, and as soon as he awoke he reached for the cell phone and checked the screen: she had not called. He rang her number again, and she didn’t answer. When
he tried one more time, she hung up. So, it was obvious. She was playing the role of the angry paramour. She wanted him to come running after her, humiliating himself. “Impossible!” he muttered, the angle of his mouth forming a vexed smile, and he began to stare at nothing in exasperation. So long as she hung up on him, she has chosen the end. He wouldn’t say good-bye but to hell with her. Who did she think she was? He said to himself: This peasant girl wants to humiliate me? What a farce. So, she doesn’t know who Tariq Haseeb is. My dignity is more important than my life. From now on I am going to delete her from my life as if she has never existed. Before I met her what did I lack? I was working, eating, sleeping, enjoying life, and living like a king. On the contrary, ever since I met her I’ve been anxious and tense.
He sat at his desk as usual, took out his books and notes, and began to study. He wrote down the main points of the lesson and exerted a great effort to stay focused. Half an hour later, however, he suddenly got up and left his apartment. He crossed the corridor quickly, as if someone were chasing him or as if he were afraid to change his mind. He took the elevator to the seventh floor. He looked in the mirror: he was wearing his blue training suit and his face looked tired and in need of a shave. He reached her door and rang the bell several times. Some time passed before she opened the door. She was wearing a house gown. He said with a smile, “Peace upon you.”
“Peace upon you, Dr. Tariq.”
Her formal tone jarred in his ears. He fixed her with a strong, pensive glance but she ignored it and said, “May it be for the good, God willing.”
“Are you still mad at me?” he said in a soft voice.
“Who said that?”
“You left me yesterday and didn’t ask about me today, as you usually do.” She looked at him in silence as if saying, You know why. “Shaymaa, may I come in, please?” She felt awkward for a moment. She never expected him to ask to come in. Previously, he had never been beyond the threshold of the apartment door. She backed away a few steps and made way for him. He went in quickly, as if he were afraid she would change her mind. He sat on a seat in the living room. She realized for the first time that she was still in her house gown so she took her leave, went inside, and stayed there for what seemed to him like a long time. Then she came back with a cup of tea, having put on an elegant green dress. She sat in the seat far away from him. He started sipping his tea and said, “So, what made you angry?”
“Do you really care to find out?” she said coquettishly, putting out a very tender feminine air. His heart skipped a beat and he said in a passionate voice, “I missed you very much.”
“Me too, but I am not comfortable with our friendship.”
“Why?”
“Every day I get more attached to you, but we’ve never talked about the future.”
She was surprised by how forward she was being. Was this the shy Shaymaa, now receiving a man in her home and talking to him like that?
“The future is in God’s hands,” he said in a soft voice in a final attempt to avoid the subject.
“Please appreciate my position. You are a man and you won’t be faulted no matter what you do. I am a girl and my family has strict conventions. Everything we do here in America will reach people in Egypt, thanks to the offices of good people who, as you know, are quite numerous. I don’t want to bring shame on my family.”
“We are not doing anything wrong.”
“Yes we are. Our relationship flies in the face of tradition, in the face of the principles I was raised on. My father, God have mercy on his soul, was an enlightened man who supported women’s education and right to work. But that does not mean I should be lax and compromise my reputation.”
“Your reputation is beyond reproach, Shaymaa.”
She went on as if she hadn’t heard him, “Why are we going out together? Why are you here now? Don’t tell me it’s collegiality because collegiality has its bounds. We have to use our heads and not be driven by emotions. Listen, Tariq, I am going to ask you a question, and I hope you’ll answer it frankly.”
“Go ahead.”
“What am I to you?”
“A friend.”
“Just a friend?” she whispered in a soft voice.
His heart shook and he said in a quavering voice, “You are a very dear person to me.”
“Only that?”
“I love you,” he said quickly, as if it had got away from him, as if he had been resisting for some time then suddenly collapsed. The atmosphere changed in an instant. It was as if he had uttered a magical word that opened all kinds of doors. She smiled and looked at him with the utmost tenderness and whispered, “Say it again.”
“I love you.”
They kept looking at each other in disbelief, as if they were clinging to that unique moment, knowing it wouldn’t last, and not certain what to do once it had passed. She got up, carried the tray and empty cups, and then asked him in a voice that was the sweetest he had heard since he met her, “I’ve made a dish of Umm Ali, would you like some?”
She didn’t wait for his answer but headed for the kitchen, and then came back carrying the plate. She was moving confidently and coquettishly as if, just now, she was feeling at the peak of her femininity. Tariq stood up to take the plate from her, but suddenly he extended his hand and held her wrist. He pulled her toward him and got so close to her that his hot, panting breath chafed her face. She pushed him away with all her strength and shouted in a choking voice, “Tariq! Are you crazy?”
Chapter 15
Behind the green curtain covering the window, in the room stacked with books and filled over the years with pipe tobacco smoke, John Graham kept a dark brown box covered with old brass ornaments. He would lock it carefully and forget about it for long periods of time. Then it would occur to him suddenly to lock the office door from inside and panting, drag the large box to the middle of the room. He would squat, take out the box’s contents, and spread them in front of him, on the floor, his whole life unwrapping itself before his eyes: black and white photographs of himself as a young man; newspaper clippings from the 1960s carrying headlines of important events; angry, antigovernment revolutionary flyers; leaflets showing pictures of children and women killed or maimed during the Vietnam War (some so horrendous he couldn’t, even after all these years, look at them for a long time); colorful, hand-painted invitations to demonstrations or open-air rock concerts; the program for Woodstock; buttons bearing the famous love and peace sign; and an Indian musical wood instrument that he used to play well. But the most cherished of the contents was a metal helmet that he took off a policeman during a violent clash in a demonstration. In the old photographs Graham was a slim young man with an unkempt beard and long hair gathered in a ponytail, wearing a loose-fitting Indian shirt, blue jeans, and sandals. Those were the “park days,” as he called them. He ate and drank, slept, and made love in Chicago’s famous parks: Grant Park and Lincoln Park.
John was one of the angry youth rebelling against the Vietnam War, who rejected everything: the church, the state, marriage, work, and the capitalist system. Most of them left their homes, their families, their jobs, and their studies. They spent the night discussing politics, smoking pot, singing and playing music, and making love. During the day they demonstrated. In August of 1968 the Democratic Party held its convention in Chicago to nominate its candidate for the presidency of the United States. Tens of thousands of young men and women demonstrated, and in a historic spectacle captured by cameras and beamed throughout the world, they lowered the American flag and raised in its place a bloodstained shirt. Then they brought a big fat pig, wrapped it in the American flag, sat it on a raised dais, and declared that they would nominate it as the best candidate for the presidency of the United States. One speaker after the other praised the pig-candidate in the midst of derisive cheers, whistles, and applause. Their message was clear. The government establishment itself was corrupt to the core, no matter which person was at the top: the rulers of America were sending the sons
of the poor to Vietnam so that their profits might multiply by millions while their own sons lived a soft life away from danger. They were also saying that the American dream was an illusion, a race with no end in sight in which nobody won. During that race, Americans worked hard and engaged in cutthroat competition that showed no mercy, to get a house, a fancy car, and a second home. They spent their life chasing a mirage only to discover at the end that they had been deceived, that the result of the race had been fixed before it even began: a handful of millionaires controlled everything, and their ratio to the total population hadn’t increased at all over fifty years, whereas the number of poor people kept rising at a rapid pace.
Chicago Page 13