Salaam: “You’re right. I deserve all this abuse and more. But there’s one thing I know, Luqman. The times are changing and so is Salaam!”
Luqman: “Don’t threaten me! We’re finished. Consider the company dissolved from this moment on!”
Salaam: “Do you think I’m stupid, or just an idiot? Do you think I don’t understand your game? You want to dissolve the company now, after everything? After you took the money, and after all we spent on buying the permit and the materials, on renovating your apartment, and on paying your rent and your overdue bills from over a year? Have you forgotten you were living for months by candlelight? Have you forgotten you were threatened with eviction from this apartment? Have you—”
Luqman: “Oh, my fucking God, Salaam! Just let it go! And if you don’t...”
Salaam: “And if I don’t, then what? Eh, Luqman? Tell me! If not, then what?”
The telephone rang. Luqman had been waiting for such an opportunity to extricate himself from the dispute and went into the office.
Najeeb said, “It’ll be okay, Miss Salaam. We’re all tired.”
“You and I are tired, sure,” Salaam followed. “But him, what’s making him tired? Can you explain to me what Master Luqman does all day long? He sits behind his desk waiting for phone calls? If receiving telephone calls was the only reason we needed the office, why did we need to pour so much money into renovating the apartment and replacing the furniture? The truth is, he’s making a mockery out of you and me! He sits, relaxing in the air-conditioned room, ordering fast food and playing solitaire. Truly, very tiring stuff—no, exhausting!”
Luqman returned to the living room. He was frowning, and he was holding a small piece of paper on which he had recorded some address. Speaking to Najeeb, he said, “A customer called. He wants us to come to his apartment for an inspection.”
Najeeb: “Now? I just returned a little while ago, and...”
Luqman: “I’ll go. I’ll see what the problem is. I’ll consider the options, explain the cost, and come back. If he agrees on the price, we’ll go back tomorrow together.”
Najeeb: “And who will stay in the office?”
Luqman: “Don’t worry about it. We’ll look into that tomorrow. The solution is a cell phone.”
Salaam: “Do you have any idea what it costs? About a thousand dollars, Mr. Luqman!”
He didn’t answer her. He didn’t even look at her. As though she were an insect. A chair. Some inanimate object. He said something in the direction of Najeeb as he went towards the front door. He grabbed the jacket hanging on the hook and went out. The door slammed behind him.
Najeeb remained standing in the middle of the room, looking at Salaam. In her rage, she had begun fanning her flushed face with her hands.
Najeeb said gently, “As long as the electricity is cut off during the day and comes back only at night, I might as well just get rid of the air conditioner. Perhaps the solution is to buy a generator.”
When he saw how furious she was, he added, “This heat is going to kill someone if it keeps being cloudy and stifling like this.”
As though suddenly remembering he was there, Salaam looked at him and asked, “When will Luqman return?”
Najeeb responded that when he was there to cover the office, Luqman took his time.
Salaam raised her eyebrows. Not bad, she thought. Without saying it directly, Najeeb is letting me know that he’s on my side in my war with Luqman. “And does he often stay out late?” she asked.
Najeed replied, “That depends on whether he visits Marina or not.”
“Marina?” screamed Salaam, as though bitten by a snake. “And who is this Marina?”
Najeeb was nonplussed, and he hastened to fix the situation by saying, “I don’t know...I didn’t say anything...If Luqman knew I mentioned her name in front of you, he’d kill me...If I tell you who she is, will you promise not say anything?”
After he had told her about Luqman’s relationship with Marina, Salaam stood up and went over to the window, trying to get more air. Najeeb looked at her back, and a half smile appeared on the corners of his mouth. The smile immediately turned to a pensive frown when she turned around. Salaam began staring as though she had suddenly happened upon the thread that would guide her to a valuable treasure.
Salaam didn’t need it to be spelled out for her that Luqman and Marina weren’t the important ones in the story, but that Najeeb had something else in mind. And Najeeb didn’t need more conversation to be certain that his hook had been well cast, and that he just needed to wiggle it a few more times, and this spinster, stuffed with money, would swallow it. Nothing in the world was easier than catching a woman in love on a hook baited with her own jealousy for another woman. And there was nothing easier than seducing Salaam, whose desire overwhelmed her like a fish being thrown up on the sand by the waves.
Najeeb slowly undid the buttons of his shirt. “Excuse me,” he said, rubbing the thick, intertwined hair on his chest, “I’m going in to take a shower.”
Salaam swallowed the saliva that gathered in the bottom of her mouth as soon as she saw his bare chest. She made a move as though intending to leave, but he grabbed her by the arm to stop her. He poured into her eyes a look charged with suggestion. He took her hand and put it on his chest. His beating heart pumped a poison that flowed through her limbs and made her shiver like a bird about to be slaughtered.
He took her to the bathroom. He sat in the bathtub and asked her to take the soap in her hand and run it over his entire body. Salaam obeyed. She began to lather his limbs slowly, leisurely, meticulously, submissively, as though she were taking the time to explore his body, getting to know one part after another.
He brought her out and stood her in the middle of the room. When he lashed her back, her neck, her thighs, her hands and feet, her breasts, and her face with his leather belt, she didn’t scream. She didn’t even moan. She twisted a little as though a gentle hand were spanking her tenderly. It didn’t frighten her to see purplish-red lines criss-crossing her body, and his hand didn’t make her jump when it reached up to pull her head back by the hair and force her onto her knees.
The more submissive she was, the more aroused Najeeb became. He rewarded her by throwing her to the ground and collapsing on top of her. He began to knock her head against the floor and spitting on her, increasing his pleasure by shouting out the obscene things.
“Salaam!” Najeeb groaned out and flopped on his back as he tried to catch his breath. His chest rose and fell with the speed of an animal fleeing from a hunter’s rifle.
Salaam opened her eyes. She wanted to scream out loud, to trill, to rejoice, to shout, “Bravo, Salaam! See how you’ve been rewarded after waiting so long!” But she suppressed that desire of hers and grabbed something to wipe off the blood that dripped from her nose and mouth onto her chest and stomach.
Salaam looked with pride and wonder at the stallion stretched out beside her on the floor and said flirtatously, “I hope you enjoyed yourself. Next time, don’t forget to enter me through the front door. For something you may not know is that I am still sealed by the red wax of my virginity.”
CHAPTER 10
This doorman didn’t have a weird accent, and he didn’t particularly look like that other doorman either.
With perfect politeness, he respectfully asked Luqman’s name and his business before inviting him to sit in one of the leather chairs scattered around the foyer. The doorman lifted the telephone receiver and said, “Miss Shireen, Mr. Luqman has arrived.” He was silent for two or three seconds, and then he said, “Mr. Luqman, Miss Shireen is waiting for you. It’s the fourth floor, the apartment on the left.”
Luqman stood, waiting for the elevator. He could have taken the stairs, but he decided deep down that people of a certain social status calmly waited for the elevator.
A woman came up, holding a boy’s hand. She greeted Luqman. “Good morning,” she said in English. She entered the elevator, and he followed her in. H
er finger went to the button for the sixth floor, and she uttered a sentence that he didn’t understand. He nodded his head, smiling and hiding feelings of distress. She pressed the button, and the elevator started going up. The clean, blond boy smiled and lifted the toy he was carrying to show it to Luqman. The elevator arrived at the sixth floor. The lady said thanks and disappeared. Luqman pressed the button for the eighth floor so as to give her the impression he understood what she had said and was just heading to a floor above hers.
He arrived at the eighth floor, but he didn’t open the door, nor did he push the button for the fourth floor. The elevator’s electric light went out. Luqman closed his eyes and felt his heart beating furiously, which was entirely out of character. “What’s wrong with you?” he asked himself. It’s no doubt that smell. The smell of a surprising perfume. It wasn’t luxurious or pleasing in the clear sense of the word, nor easily defined like spices or flowers. A light scent, unrevealing. Nothing over the top, but subdued. It whispers deliberately, and by the time you are paying attention to it, it has already penetrated you and taken up residence.
Luqman opened his eyes. What in the world was waiting for him on the fourth floor? Miss Shireen! He hadn’t told Najeeb and Salaam that the customer was a woman who had a beautiful voice and spoke in a strange accent. As soon as he heard that voice in the telephone receiver, his anger had vanished like water poured over him that ran right off his skin.
Luqman pushed the elevator door partway open, and the light came back on. He turned around to a big mirror and stood looking at himself. If only he had taken a shower before coming. Or at the very least, if only he had put on some cologne. He wet his fingers with saliva and ran them through his hair to slick it back. He adjusted the collar of his jacket. Luqman raised an eyebrow and frowned. No! It would be better to smile a little, with a hint of a frown. “Not bad at all, Mr. Luqman,” he said to himself. Then he looked at his hairy chest where a chain was hanging down. He breathed in deeply and exhaled, holding in his stomach to hide the small potbelly that had begun to protrude somewhat. Luqman thought he needed a little exercise to take care of any negative effects of his thirty-eight years.
“It’s nice to meet you, Miss Shireen,” he said aloud and with an aggressive self-confidence. But he soon decided that his shirt had too many buttons open to tempt a woman with a name like this. How old was she? Was she blond or dark? Blond, definitely. Tall and alluring, but without any vulgarity. Her voice revealed all that. Well, what do you think, Partner? If she actually is as you imagine and expect, if my guess hits the mark, and she is splendid, lovely, and well born, promise me you’ll keep your head to demonstrate that you, too, had a good upbringing.
The elevator suddenly started going down, and Luqman knew that someone at the bottom must have summoned it. Luqman pressed the stop button, and then the button for the fourth floor. Meanwhile, he quickly buttoned his shirt up and hid his necklace inside it. He had intended to leave the last button open, but fate decreed to pop off one of his middle buttons, the one over his stomach, to be precise. It flew up against the mirror, bounced off, and fell into the small crack between the floor and the elevator door.
Now Luqman was standing in front of her door in a shirt open at the belly button. The last thing he needed! And what to do now? Turn on his heel and go back where he came from?
Luqman looked at the small white square to the side of the door and read her full name. Dear God, how could he leave a woman bearing a name like this without even having seen her? Goddamn her, who could she be? And since when had he, Luqman, feared the glances of women like her? Who could say she wasn’t an old woman who retained only an aristocratic surname?
Luqman pushed the doorbell. He stood and waited. When he didn’t hear a response, he pressed again, harder this time, until he saw a shadow cover the light of the peephole and the door opened.
She let him in quickly and apologized, running back to the other room because she was talking on the telephone. Luqman closed the door. He went down the hall, guided by her voice. He was annoyed by the sound of his worn-out sandals on the white marble, so he walked half on tiptoes in order to soften his footfalls.
He pressed on into the living room. He was surprised by the amount of light pouring through the large glass window, opening to sea and sky. The few pieces of furniture, scattered here and there, were yellow and white. Plants, different levels, sofas low to the floor, and a large wooden trunk that was carved and inlaid with mosaics. A stereo playing soft music. Magazines and newspapers thrown on the floor. Files and papers piled up on a large table, which also had a computer that was turned on. Paintings with strange shapes and colors, a large vase filled with an enormous bouquet of flowers.
Luqman sat in the closest seat he found. It was very low. He crossed one leg over the other. His small paunch pressed out and made the absence of a button obvious. He decided to remedy the situation by closing his jacket even though it was hot. He wasn’t comfortable in his position, so he shifted both feet back to the floor. He wondered about what to do with his hands. He thought about going to the chair near the table but changed his mind when he remembered his sandals and calculated the distance he would have to cover to reach it.
How uncomfortable and annoyed he was! He shouldn’t have come. He should have stayed with Najeeb and Salaam. It’s all your fault, Partner! You always entangle me by inventing stories and situations. Take a good look at her. Do you think a woman like her would turn to look at you or pay you any attention?
Kneeling near the big glass window, she was speaking French into the phone, mixing some Arabic words into her sentences. He hadn’t been able to make out her features well in the dark hallway, and now he was unable to see anything except her back. She didn’t have a large build. She walked around barefoot. She wore jeans and a white shirt that was much too big for her slender body.
Her thick, red hair was gathered on top of her head and held in place by a pencil. She reached up behind her head to find a strand that had escaped and push it in with the rest. The nape of her shining white neck came into view, flashing at him in the sunlight with a soft, blond fuzz, like a sparrow’s downy feathers. Her hand remained, holding her neck as she moved her head back and forth. A small hand, a child’s hand. Her fingers were neither fat nor skinny, but just as they should be. Her fingernails were short and unpainted.
Suddenly, she turned towards him and smiled. Then she went on speaking into the receiver.
She was wearing glasses! Small, round, thin glasses with metal frames anchored on her petite nose. Luqman couldn’t believe his eyes. A young woman with glasses—what in the world! It was as though he had never seen something like this before. Or if he had, it was utterly unlike what he was seeing now.
She grew tired of her previous position, moving her head a little and sitting cross-legged on the floor. He saw a third of her face. He couldn’t see her mouth, which was hidden behind her hand. She was biting her nails and frowning. No earrings. No bracelet or necklace. Just a small, round watch with a delicate black leather band. How old was she? In her early thirties. Or her late twenties. Somewhere in there, to be sure.
A woman like this makes a man desire to eat her, not to sleep with her, Luqman thought. Like a piece of hard candy, Turkish delight, or cotton candy. He would put her in his mouth, and instead of chewing, he would let her melt on his tongue to release her flavor slowly. Marina had her mint flavor. And Miss Shireen? Strawberry or orange. No, she wasn’t a flavor, but an odor. Jasmine. That was it. She would spread through the room if the air moved her. She would blow away in silence, slowly, gently flowing back and forth on breezes intermingling like waves. Everything about her was different and unfamiliar. Her street, her doorman, her neighbor, her elevator, her name, her apartment, her accent, everything.
“I’ve kept you waiting. I’m sorry, but it was a work call.”
Luqman didn’t respond. He kept staring at her for a few seconds. Then, when she came over and stretched out her hand to
shake, he stood up abruptly and greeted her warmly. She apologized again, saying she would turn off the computer and be all his in just a moment. The phrase pleased him: in just a moment she’d “be all his.”
She went to the table. He remained standing and a certain embarrassment came over him until he put his hand in his pants pocket and turned to look at a painting hanging on the wall. In order to make conversation with her, he said, “It’s a very beautiful painting. Did you make it?”
“C’est une reproduction de Van Gogh. Elle vous plaît?” Shireen answered in French, still staring at the computer screen.
Luqman wondered what he should answer now, given that he didn’t understand a word she had said. From the music of her voice, he sensed she had asked him a question. His guess was confirmed when he saw her looking at him over her work table as though waiting for some response. He looked at her. Then he nodded and smiled while raising an eyebrow.
She smiled in turn as she figured out that he didn’t understand French. In order to find a way out for herself and to put him at ease, she turned back to the computer screen and said, “You’re making fun of me!”
Luqman took a deep breath to calm his heart after having safely passed that test. He decided to press the attack before she launched another loaded question. He said, “If you don’t mind my asking, what kind of work do you do?”
She turned off the computer and stood up, asking him if he wanted a bit of Nescafé. Luqman said yes and thanked her. She invited him to come with her. That way, she could show him at the same time where she had seen the mouse.
Walking in front of him down the hallway to the kitchen, she said, “I work in archeological excavations. I came with a French delegation as part of a joint program between UNESCO and the Public Conservation Administration.”
Oh, Salaam! Page 7