Footsteps on the floor startle me to my feet. Salem stands a couple inches away. “Why are you still here?” he shouts, saliva spewing out of his mouth. I almost wonder if he knows about my date with Rami because I’m not sure what he’s talking about. “The owner asked me to come look for you like I’m your father or something. I made the mistake of trusting you and you go and try to turn my nephew gay!”
“I’m not turning anyone gay!” I retaliate. “I’m not gay," I say less forcefully.
Salem roughly unzips his trousers. As I rush out of the washroom, I hear his stream of piss hitting the urinal.
When I get home, I race to my room and keep the lights turned off. It is dark outside. Winter has beckoned the night to come early. I sit on the ledge of my window, staring out into the street. When I see Rami’s green Chevy approaching, I fall to the floor and peek out the window, making sure Rami can’t see me. His shoulders are straight when he walks to my door. His tap is forceful, confident. He knocks. Tries again. Then my phone rings. I look at it on my side table but don’t pick it up. There is another knock, louder this time. I lift myself up and peer out the window again and see Rami’s shadow shrinking on the snow-covered path to my house. Within minutes, he returns to his car and sits in it for a while. It idles and it’s the only sound I can hear in my neighbourhood. I slide completely onto the floor and crawl to my bed and hoist myself up. Looking up at the ceiling, I pray he’ll drive away. The idling breaks, then starts up and the engine doesn’t seem to stop for a while until, at last, I don’t hear anything at all. I stumble towards the window and look down. Rami is staring up at me. He waves and comes to the door again.
I walk down the stairs and open the door. Rami walks inside, smiling widely. He squeezes my waist. I step back and show him into the living room. “I think you forget. It Friday? We got plan, no?” he says quietly.
I nod and don’t make an effort to apologize, nor to correct his broken English which I have grown to adore. My heart is racing so fast that I can feel it in my throat. “Have a seat. I’ll be ready in a few minutes.” I hurry back upstairs and change into a new sweater and clean jeans. I splash some cologne on my cheeks and neck. When I glance at myself in the mirror, I take a deep breath and say everything will be all right. “It’s not a date," I say out loud. “Just a friendly dinner between two men.” Not a date, I repeat in my mind. Then why do I feel so nervous? I want to slap myself across the face and tell myself to grow up. But there’s no time. Rami is downstairs.
When I return to the living room, Rami stands up and walks towards me. He reaches across to touch my back but I’m already down the steps and on the sidewalk, walking fast, Rami trailing behind and shouting, “Wait! What about car?”
I turn and smile. “I told you we’d walk. Walking is better for us. You can walk, right?”
He pretends to be difficult, “Yeah but my leg tired.”
I smile and say, “But you have long legs. You can keep up with my fast pace, no?”
He finally reaches me and puts his arm around my shoulder. I tense up and try to move away, but he has a firm, but not unkindly, hold on me. “Of course!” He lets go and hurries as we rush across the road and head to the mainstreet.
I take him to the small Lebanese café where Denise and I had once gone together. It’s quiet for a Friday night. We share some dishes of maza and talk about our workday. I complain about my lousy job and he says he actually enjoys working in the government. “Well, I would too if I got paid to do nothing," I laugh. We converse in Arabic.
“Not true. Public servants work.”
“With ten million breaks, I bet.”
He tries not to laugh but does anyway. Then I hear the forceful, deep grunt of the word ayb. I turn and notice two men at the bar staring at us. I don’t say anything for a while and keep looking back at those men, who throw me a look of disgust.
Sitting back in his chair, Rami folds his arms across his chest and asks, “Is everything all right?”
“Yeah, just some assholes at the bar.”
“Forget about them.” He reaches across, squeezes my hand and I don’t move this time. I let his skin touch mine without feeling guilty even when those assholes mutter ayb again.
He finally lets go of my hand and we eat and laugh some more for no particular reason. I glance back at the men at the bar, who now rise from their seats and leave. I watch them, but then my attention diverts back to Rami. I lightly pat his hand and say, “Thank you for coming out with me tonight. This was nice.”
“Really?”
I nod and pop an olive into my mouth.
After we leave the restaurant, Rami puts his arm around my shoulder and we walk along a secluded pathway. We don’t talk, just stroll quietly. There’s no need for words, I think. I turn and stare at Rami. He drops his arm from my shoulder and lets his arms swing by his side; he has a big smile on his face. We continue walking. It is cold and the snow has hardened on the asphalt, making some parts slippery. I nearly slip but Rami catches me. He speaks in Arabic. “Be careful, my friend.”
“Thank you. I hate winter!”
“Me too. But I hate the alternative even more. At least we have peace here.”
“Yes," I agree. “There aren’t any bombs exploding. Montreal isn’t a broken city.”
“I guess it depends on whom you ask!”
“You know what I mean. I know the French and English don’t always get along, but there’s not the violence like in the Middle East. When I was young, I met this man and," I hesitate and stare at Rami, whose eyes are soft with concern, “he pretended to be my friend. I trusted him… I was just a child. One day I was home alone and I let him into the apartment. I… he…” My voice cracks.
“Did he hurt you?”
I don’t answer him. He puts his right arm around my shoulders, then his left around my waist and guides me into his body. “It’s okay," he says again and again. I blink my eyes and rest my chin on his broad shoulder. Lifting my head slightly, I look up at the blurry, bluish-white moon; it stares sadly at me.
Rami walks me to my house.
“Do you want to come in?” I ask. Lowering my eyes, I suddenly feel embarrassed about crying in his arms. “I’m sorry about...you know.”
“It okay. It good to cry," he says gently in English.
“I know," I say with a sigh. “Are you sure you don’t want to come in?”
“Next time.”
“I had fun.”
“Me too.”
He kisses me on both cheeks and says, “Yallah, bye.”
I watch him depart, the moonlight guiding him home.
Eighteen
AMIR STROLLS THROUGH AN olive grove. He stops at a tree and shakes the boughs. Sea green olives rain like hailstones. Bending over, he picks up one from the ground and grasps it between his fingers as if memorizing its smoothness, colour. He gazes across at the mountain in the distance then spreads his arms out and runs through the grove.
He races through the field, then down some streets until he reaches his grandparents’ house. It’s the olive season in Lebanon and Amir has come up for the weekend to help his grandparents with the harvest. He’s almost done his Master’s degree in American Literature and he knows this will probably be one of the last times he’ll see his grandparents. He likes to take little breaks in the town of Rashaya where his grandparents live in a small stone house. When he arrives at their home, his grandmother greets him, squeezing his waist and pulling him into her round body. She kisses him on the cheeks and won’t let him go until his grandfather comes and does the same thing but with fewer kisses. Amir leaves his bag at the door and they lead him into the kitchen, where the table is covered with dishes of maza: stuffed grape leaves, fattoush, hommus and goat cheese.
Later, after dinner, he stands on the terrace while his grandparents sit on white plastic chairs and crack open pistachios and roasted pumpkin seeds. The smell of rich Turkish coffee fills the open sky. It’s a beautiful clear autumn evening. A co
ol breeze brushes Amir’s longish curls away from his face. He grasps the railing of the terrace and looks at the town from above, hypnotized by its red roofs and cobblestone roads. Then he lets his gaze fall upon the mountains and the thought of conquering them before the end of this weekend enters his mind. Desire throbs in his heart and he knows he has to do this feat before he returns to his lonely dorm room, where books and torn pages, filled with his scribbled thoughts and words, are his only companions during those long academic months.
The next morning, Amir wakes to the cry of a rooster. He lies with a stiff neck on an old cot. He sits up quickly and rubs his eyes, adjusting them to the morning light that fills the stone house. Suddenly drawn to the light coming from the kitchen, he tiptoes across the floor. His grandmother is already up making breakfast, filling the kitchen with the strong scent of eggs scrambled with lamb preserves. It’s been a while since Amir has eaten awarma. “Good morning, ya habibi, sit down," his grandmother says. She pours a large serving of eggs into his plate. “Eat before your grandfather hogs it all!” Laughing, she returns to the stove and mixes some more minced lamb meat and eggs together.
Within minutes, his grandfather walks quietly across the kitchen, wraps his arms around his wife’s big belly and pecks her behind the neck. “What’s this about me eating all the food?” She startles and the spoon she uses to scramble the eggs flies across the room. She turns around quickly and playfully smacks her husband on the shoulder. Amir has a wide grin on his face. Then he frowns, thinking of his own parents and how they never tease one another in this loving manner. He’s surprised his grandparents bore a daughter as tough as his mother. Once the eggs are finished, they all sit around the table and eat, sipping warm coffee. Amir’s grandfather tells him that they’ll head out to the grove right after breakfast.
With efficiency, his grandfather’s calloused hands grasp branches and he instructs Amir to use the stick to whip the boughs. Olives loosen and fall to the ground and Amir squats and picks them up, then tosses them into baskets. It takes them the whole day to fill only a few baskets. By the time they venture back to the house, the sky has turned violet and dim streetlights flicker on. Driving his grandfather’s truck, he spots two children in the middle of the road, right in front of him. He slams his foot on the brake and his grandfather curses at the kids, who look to be about twelve. The boy, still holding the girl’s hand, salutes them with his free middle finger and Amir can’t help but laugh, and this makes his grandfather chuckle too. “Children these days have no respect for their elders, Amir. They’re not like you.” He waits for the kids to cross the street and as soon as they reach the other side, they exchange a small kiss and Amir frowns and stares down at his dirty hands on the steering wheel. Witnessing this sweet innocence makes him sad and he clenches his teeth as he feels tears forming. Don’t cry, he begs silently in his head. Don’t cry. He wills himself not to cry, not to turn and look at his grandfather, who suddenly reaches across and squeezes his shoulder. “Amir," he whispers. “I know you didn’t have an easy childhood. I know. My daughter isn’t the easiest person to get along with, but," he pauses and lifts his thin-lipped mouth into a grin, “she takes after her mother, of course!” And just then, instead of crying, he bursts into laughter. They laugh until he parks the vehicle in front of the house. His grandmother greets them and his grandfather gives him a knowing wink. They empty the baskets out of the truck just as dusk sinks behind the mountains.
The following day, mustering the courage, Amir rushes down the stairs, past his grandparents who are sitting in the living room, his grandfather’s watery, old eyes mesmerized by the beautiful Lebanese woman reporting another explosion at a building in the centre of Beirut, while his grandmother, enthralled in her knitting, tries to ignore his comments about the attractiveness of that woman. “I’d look just as beautiful," his grandmother suddenly barks, “if I didn’t have to always cook for you in a hot kitchen and clean your dirty clothes. Plus look how much makeup is caked on her face. Anyone can look beautiful with all that on!”
Amir’s grandfather chuckles, then stretches out his shaky arm, squeezes his wife’s wrinkled hand and says, “You’re beautiful. The only woman for me.”
“Of course, you old fool, no other woman in her right mind would put up with you!” she says, smirking.
When his grandfather spots him, he says, “Amir! Your grandmother loves me so much, she’s jealous of the newsgirl.”
“Jealous!” she grumbles. Then turns to her husband and says, “Inta humar.”
“You’re a donkey, old woman!” he laughs.
Amir covers his mouth with his hands and tries not to laugh but can’t help it. He leans over the doorway and says, “You’re both made for each other, Jido and Teta. Two donkeys!”
“Don’t call your grandmother a donkey, Amir, it’s not nice," his grandfather says, winking at him.
“Okay, okay. Sorry, Teta," he says, sauntering over to his grandmother and planting a kiss on her cheek. She looks up and smiles. “Can you forgive me?”
She nods her head vigorously.
“I’m going out for a bit.”
“Where?” asks his grandmother.
“To climb a mountain.”
“What?”
“Nowhere," he says, on second thought, not wanting to explain nor get a lecture on the dangers of mountain climbing. “Just going out. See you later!” he says loudly before racing away.
He walks past the olive groves and spots a few people whipping branches and gathering olives, mostly older couples like his grandparents. He’s glad that his grandfather has decided to wait until next weekend to gather some more. This gives Amir a chance to climb a mountain before this mini-break from his studies is over. It takes him about an hour to reach the end of the town. He stands with his hands on his hips, gazing up at the mountain and wonders if he can conquer it. But before he can talk himself out of it, he makes his way up the foothills, past several more groves.
An hour later, he rests on some uneven rocks surrounding a ravine and cups water in his hands, gulping the refreshing, cool liquid. He shakes his head for not having packed a large water bottle in his backpack. Bending over, he cups more water and lifts it to his dry lips. For several minutes, he rests on the rock and takes in his surroundings. Some wild flowers grow between the rocks and he listens carefully to the stream running between the rough stones. Out here in the open, away from the city and its constant unrest, he feels at peace and forgets the nightmares that still haunt him after all these years. Walid doesn’t enter his mind as much while he’s away from Beirut, and he wonders if he’ll completely forget about him when he moves to Canada. Out of sight, out of mind, he thinks to himself. Maybe leaving for a new place will make it easier for him to forget that tragic day. He puts his elbows on his knees and lowers his head in prayer. And he wonders if God can hear him now. Away from the bombs and bloodshed. But then he jolts up and kicks at the rock until a crumbling piece falls into the stream. “Fuck you!” he shouts into the air. “Fuck you for doing this to me! Fuck you!” he raises his fists then falls to the ground and weeps for the young child he had been, for the young man he could’ve been if he hadn’t been raped. You’re trouble, he hears his mother murmur in his ears. He covers them and, after a while, he rises from the ground, wiping his eyes with the backs of his hands. With his shoulders straight and head held high, he treks up the mountain. A certain excitement fills his lungs when he finally reaches the top.
Nineteen
I LOOK AT THE dirty dishes and I don’t feel the excitement I had felt when I had climbed and conquered the mountain of Rashaya. I don’t make eye contact with Salem as he stares across at me. He doesn’t know that I’ve been hanging out with Rami. I feel like a teenager having to sneak out of my parents’ house to meet a girlfriend, but Rami and I aren’t quite lovers. I’m not sure what he is to me. We enjoy each other’s company. I help him with his English. He relieves the loneliness I sometimes feel being so far away from my homel
and and family even though I had chosen to leave them. There is something about my relationship with Rami that just feels right. I can’t explain it. I sometimes think about Denise and hope she’s okay, but there isn’t the heartache I thought I’d have without her in my life.
Salem suddenly stands in front of me and says, “Rami has a girlfriend. You remember Mirah, don’t you? She’s out in the restaurant with him now.”
My mouth opens, then closes. “That’s nice," I say, trying to sound happy for him. But I’m not. Jealousy reddens my cheeks and I’m almost tempted to head into the restaurant to confront Rami with his girlfriend.
“He’s not gay," Salem says in a low voice.
“Good for him," I scoff.
“You think I don’t know that you still socialize with him? I know everything.” Salem stuffs his large hands in his front pockets. The apron wrapped around his belly juts out slightly.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I haven’t seen your nephew since the day he drove me home. That was the last time.”
“Good. Leave him alone, Amir. If I find out that you’re going out with him, I’ll kill you.”
I don’t know if he’s joking or not but I laugh anyway. “I’m really scared!” I yell, smashing a dish across the water, some splatters on Salem’s apron. The other cooks look up but then pretend that they can’t hear or see what’s going on. Salem lunges at me but I step back. “Don’t touch me," I say, my voice trembling.
The Lebanese Dishwasher Page 10