Live from Cairo

by Ian Bassingthwaighte

  Hana said, “I can’t be here,” and Dalia said, “I don’t think . . . ,” at the same time. Why allow them to enter? Why expose her apartment to scorn? The ceiling would sag in the middle. The shower drain, partially but irreversibly clogged, would present the smell of mold like a gift to her visitors. Not the kind who were invited; the other kind, who showed up unannounced without bearing pastries or other sweet treats to abate the badness of their manners. Dalia expected Hana to lack such courtesy, but was surprised by Charlie; he’d always been oddly aware of how she felt and what she wanted.

  “Well, we can talk here. That’s fine.” Charlie looked up and down the hallway as if that wasn’t fine. It wasn’t fine at all.

  A strange and sudden pressure—Dalia’s ears popped—sucked open the door when a gust of wind blew past her open window. Charlie and Hana both peered in as if their heads were similarly drawn. Did they see squalor? Or did they see how Dalia had disguised the space? Pictures of her old life owned the walls. The couch defied the stark floor with its plush cushions. Why had the past inhabitants left such a couch behind? Three wooden chairs, each with a piece of bright laundry drying on its back, proved space limitations were no match for a woman who insisted on clean clothing. At least, as clean as possible given the nature of where and how she washed them. (In the sink using tepid water.) A woman on the first floor who had hot water did laundry with soap for “donations”—just a pound or two per piece—but Dalia couldn’t justify the extravagance. She’d grown accustomed to telling Omran exactly how she spent his money. Not that he wanted to know. He’d asked her many times not to tell him. The money he sent was hers. She deserved it more than him. “Forget the expense,” he said. “I’ll work harder. I’ll work more.” In Omran’s voice, Dalia heard a man drowning in his want to provide.

  “You might as well come in,” said Dalia now that her door was open. In a hadith, Muhammad said be generous to guests. There were no listed exceptions. “Please, sit.” Dalia gestured to the couch before steeping tea. She used mint to cover the smell of the shower drain. Upon delivering the steaming cups, Dalia imagined spilling them into the laps of her guests. The image of them wriggling in pain was satisfying. Hana should’ve known better than to come; Charlie should’ve known better than to bring her.

  “How’s Omran?” Charlie blew the steam off his cup. He rubbed his thumb against his index finger. Odd, thought Dalia. That rubbing.

  Lacking a proper seat of her own, Dalia sat on her laundry. “Determined to ‘come back.’ He says that like he’s been here before. And I must tell you. I don’t want him to come. There’s nothing here for us. I’ve told him the same thing many times before. Maybe he has a hearing problem.” Dalia turned to the wall of pictures. A four-by-six-inch catalog of everything that had once made her happy. “I knocked the nails in with a book,” she said proudly. Omran dancing. Omran holding the cat. Omran washing cabbages in the sink.

  “How long since you’ve seen him?” asked Charlie.

  “A long time. I don’t count the days.”

  “You don’t miss him?”

  Charlie was either stupid or cold. Except Dalia knew he wasn’t either of those things. Whenever they met to discuss her case, he gave more than his time. He gave his attention. He remembered everything. He knew what questions to ask and how long to pause before asking them. He knew when to turn off his tape recorder. He knew when to leave the room and for how long. He was, or had been, the rare sort of man who could hear things he hadn’t said himself. It had occurred to Dalia many times before that their relationship wasn’t entirely professional. Somewhere along the way they’d become friends.

  “The opposite reason,” said Dalia finally. It took her a few seconds to forgive Charlie for what he’d said. “I thank God every day for the phone.”

  An eerie thing happened. A phone rang somewhere in the distance. It should’ve been less eerie. Tens if not hundreds of phones were within earshot. That was life in a dense neighborhood peppered with open windows. Still, Dalia felt the rings were meant for her. Someone far away had something important to say.

  “So, about the rejection,” said Charlie. Dalia assumed the bad news was about to get worse and stopped listening. “Like I said, a bit hasty. Given that you forgot to answer an important question at your interview.” Dalia’s small apartment felt much smaller with three people stuffed inside. Three people, she thought, was a fire hazard. “A very important question. All the questions, of course, are important. But this one especially so. I’m troubled you weren’t asked before.”

  “What question?” asked Dalia.

  A heretofore petrified Hana leaned in as if she also wanted to know.

  Charlie wrung his hands. When Dalia glanced at them, he stopped wringing. “How’d you get Omran back? Tell Hana what you told me. Please, you have to say it out loud. I know it’s difficult.”

  Dalia almost laughed at Charlie’s posturing. What did he really know? Nothing. He didn’t know what it felt like to tell the world something she couldn’t bear to tell her own husband. Why did it matter how she’d secured his release, anyway? The better story was how she’d secured his hand in marriage. Against her father’s will! That would go down in history as one of the great rebellions. Maybe not world history, but family history. Dalia looked again at the photo of Omran washing cabbages with more care than they deserved. Practice, he’d said in all seriousness, for parenthood. “I wasn’t supposed to marry him,” said Dalia. She didn’t look at her guests because she wasn’t speaking for their benefit. “My father was so angry.” The rebellion started with a borrowed car. No, before that. It started when Dalia, at the age of seventeen, fell in love with Omran even though she was betrothed to another man. The betrothal was her father’s arrangement, not her desire. She loved Omran. It took them more than a year to kiss for the first time, but by the end of the same week Dalia had removed her shirt and Omran had cowered at the prospect of seeing her in a way he’d thought was holy. Nude as the day she was born. At least, half-nude. More like nude from the waist up, except for the scarf. Sixty percent nude. “I can’t,” said Omran. He’d always been more devout than Dalia, or at least more afraid of God’s judgment. He’d cowered by turning away and saying, “Not yet. Soon, I promise you.” Dalia, for her part, hadn’t been so shy. She’d turned his head back with her fingers and said, “You’re embarrassing me. Look, I’m embarrassed.” He’d finally looked; she’d been smiling widely.

  Dalia didn’t tell Omran she was betrothed to another man until one day, in the last year of secondary school, when she said, “We need to run. I want to marry you. I’m going to borrow the car.”

  “What car?”

  “My father’s car. Wait for me in the alley?”

  “When?”

  “Right now. We have to go. I’m betrothed to another man.”

  “What other man?” cried Omran.

  Dalia knew it wasn’t the time to explain, but Omran didn’t know that. To spur him along, she kissed him with way more tongue than was normally appropriate given who could’ve seen. His father. Her father. “Wait for me in the alley! Please, will you wait for me? I won’t be more than a few minutes. Ten minutes, at most. If I’m not here in ten minutes, then . . .”

  “Don’t say that.”

  “I’m kidding. Just wait for me. Will you wait?”

  Omran said yes as if the word had to be coaxed from his throat. Then he said the same word several times as his love and fear revealed their magnitude. “Yes!” he shouted. He ran so fast to pack his things that he nearly tripped over his own feet.

  “Only bring what you need.”

  “Pants, shirts, socks, shoes, toothbrush, toothpaste, hair comb . . . ,” said Omran, fleeing. His list continued, but trailed off as he turned the corner.

  Dalia was suddenly alone in her doorway. She lived by herself in an apartment separate from, but immediately next to, her parents’, willed to her by an uncle who’d died in a motorcycle accident. Her uncle had been driving f
ast on a desert road. What were desert roads for if not driving fast in a straight line into oblivion? He’d lost control and slid a hundred meters across the tar, leaving a trail of clothes and skin. When Dalia had moved next door, her father had been more heartbroken by her departure than his brother’s death. The fighting had been loud and remained continuous. He said it made him look weak, that his daughter didn’t live in his house. “The buildings share a wall,” said Dalia. “But not a roof,” said her father. Now she tried to summon the courage required to borrow his car. Lacking courage, Dalia ran next door. She ran the way Omran ran to pack. If she ran fast enough, she would arrive before second-guessing herself. She would have no choice but to say what she wanted. Her father’s door was suddenly before her. Would she let herself in? Or would she heed her father’s word? He’d said, “If you don’t live here, then you must knock.” Dalia pounded the door with her fist. The moment before the latch clicked and the door opened extended into painful territory. Dalia spent the time preparing her speech. Father, can I borrow the car? . . . No, I won’t bring it back. I suppose that means I’m asking to have it. . . . I know, but please. I’m sorry. I can’t tell you where I’m going. Please, Father. In time, I’ll buy you another car.

  When the door opened, Dalia kissed her father’s cheek. He smelled like tobacco and dirt. His cheek felt like paper. He embraced Dalia; she was dismayed. His large, rough hands made her feel so young.

  “As-salamu alaikum.”

  Her father cocked his head at the formal greeting. “Wa alaikum al-salaam. It’s good to see you.”

  “I came to talk.”

  “Then it’s a good day. Your mother misses you.”

  A code, she knew. Her father never expressed love except indirectly through his wife. He said, “Kiss your mother. Hug your mother. Call your mother.” When Dalia did call, her father would commandeer the phone. He’d ramble—on God, school, poetry—until her mother complained in the background about the phone bill. Her complaint was a criticism in disguise. Why wouldn’t her husband go next door? Why wouldn’t her daughter come home?

  “I have a lot to say.”

  “Not until you kiss your mother.”

  “Please, it’s important.”

  “Your family is important. She misses you.”

  “Family is the people you love,” said Dalia. “Right?”

  “That’s right.”

  “I love Omran.”

  “Omran?”

  “Yes, Omran.”

  “The boy with no land?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Or even a job?”

  “Not yet!”

  “Oh my God.”

  “I’m sorry. I have to go. Can I borrow the car?”

  Dalia saw a shadow pacing in the hall. She wanted nothing more than to invite the shadow to become her mother. Her mother would’ve been a force of reason. She would’ve taken Dalia’s side. In a canny way, to be sure. Father would talk about God to instill obedience; mother would talk reason to fight back. “Don’t use the hadiths to effect your ill will upon our daughter!” The fight would change hands and Dalia would be free to abscond with the car keys. Yet something stopped Dalia from calling her mother’s name. The feeling that later her mother would be made to pay for responding.

  “What do you mean, ‘love’?” her father asked.

  “I mean I’m going to marry him even though I’m betrothed to another man. I don’t care what God thinks. Or what you do. I do care somewhat because I’m telling you. But not so much that I’d abandon my love for your approval!”

  Was this really the right way to borrow the car? By telling her father everything? Now instead of later? When time and anger had passed? When Dalia could say with certainty that everything was okay? That she’d made the right choice? That Omran had found a job? That she was back in school? That a small act against God was required in pursuit of happiness?

  “You don’t care what God thinks?” her father boomed.

  “I don’t know.” Dalia loved God and feared Him for the pain He caused.

  “Where did this come from? You’re betrothed! You can’t borrow the car!”

  Dalia grabbed the keys off the dining room table and her father grabbed Dalia by the arm.

  “I have to go!” shouted Dalia. “I want Omran so much I would steal your car. Sorry, I’m stealing it!”

  “You’re going to steal from your own father?”

  “I wouldn’t have to steal the car if you’d let me borrow it!”

  Dalia escaped her father’s grip by shaking her arm violently. No grip could’ve survived her shaking. She was like a hummingbird with Herculean wings.

  “Let her borrow the car,” said her mother, stepping from the hall into the light. Her presence emboldened Dalia the same way wind emboldens a kite. “She’ll bring it back. You will, won’t you?”

  Dalia locked eyes with her father. “I have to think I’ll be forgiven for this. What else can I do? Attend my own wedding as a reluctant bride? Not wanting the man I must have? No, I won’t! The Qur’an says that after you’ve been intimate and made your solemn pledge, you can’t take it back. I have made my solemn pledge.”

  “You’ve been intimate?” screamed her father.

  “I’ve made my solemn pledge!”

  “Oh, no.”

  Dalia locked eyes with her mother and said everything she needed to with a passing glance: I love you, but I can’t ever come home. Then she stole the car and drove to Baghdad with Omran sitting wide-eyed in the passenger seat. He shut his eyes when they got sand in them, but left the window open. The wind, he said, gave him courage. Omran couldn’t say why, but it didn’t matter; Dalia knew what he meant. They married a few months later in a distant village so Omran’s parents could attend without being shamed by their neighbors. Other benefits included a lower cost and a better view than in Baghdad. Sadly, Dalia’s parents didn’t make the journey. A note arrived in their stead. My star, a gift of admiration. Love and greetings. Your mother. Dalia remembered scouring the note for any sign of her father. A faint smudge mark the size of his thumb. But there was no sign of him. It was then that Dalia knew she’d been banished.

  Charlie—suddenly and loudly—cleared his throat. “Ahem.”

  It occurred to Dalia that she’d been staring into empty space for a while now. Her attempt to chase down more pleasant years had borne sour fruit. It was excruciating to think those years had been more pleasant.

  “Please,” said Charlie. “Tell us how you secured Omran’s release.”

  Dalia locked eyes with him the same way she’d once locked eyes with her parents. How else to tell him what he didn’t want to hear? That it was late. That she was tired. That he needed to leave. Dalia couldn’t just say that. Not after all Charlie had done for her. Had he really done so much? Not in measurable terms, maybe. In measurable terms, he’d done almost nothing. Though there wasn’t much he could do. Charlie had said so at their first meeting. “I just write testimonies and submit case files. The rest is up to other people.” Wasn’t it Dalia’s fault for believing he could do more? He had done more, she supposed. His optimism had rubbed off. For a few decent months she’d believed her time in Cairo was temporary. The memory of those months was precious, for they included conversations with Omran in which he’d discussed the future by making lists. The lists had oddly long titles such as:

  What We’ll Do in Boston Once You Get Here

  1. Find a larger apartment

  2. Learn to cook the American cuisine

  3. Have several children

  4. Feed them the American cuisine

  And longer still:

  How to Have the Children Mentioned in the Previous List

  1. Eat a light dinner

  2. Put on the romantic music

  3. THIS POINT HAS BEEN CENSORED (consult Rumi for clues)

  4. Ha! A baby!

  5. Repeat as necessary

  Dalia had laughed, which had caught Omran a little off guard. The lists w
eren’t intended as jokes. To him, the lists were serious. He’d spent a lot of time considering even his mirthful points. Regarding the American cuisine, he’d said, “I want our children to fit in. I want them to like the food. It’s very salty. I had to adjust.” Regarding the romantic music, he’d said, “Faisal has shown me many tapes that I’ve never heard before. Now I have tapes to show you. There are several I think you will like.” Dalia had apologized for laughing. She hadn’t meant to make fun. It was just that she’d wanted those things so badly she couldn’t bear to say aloud that she’d wanted them. The goal now, with all that taken away, was to thank Charlie for making those conversations possible in the first place. Only in such abundance could his optimism actually rub off on Dalia, who prided herself on being realistic. She’d loved the few months when she’d not been exactly herself. The only way Dalia knew how to thank Charlie was to resist the urge to kick him out. If the man had any sense, he’d soon leave of his own accord.

  Charlie seemed to deflate when he exhaled and hunched slightly. The hunch grew worse over time. It was as if his body were sinking into and perhaps even through the couch. Dalia couldn’t watch him without feeling things that would be rude to say. She watched Hana instead of saying them. Hana looked nervous and ready to bolt. Dalia’s steady eye contact made it a thousand times worse for her. Hana sat up straight. She became flustered and distressed. It was sweet, petty, harmless revenge for the way Hana had stared at Dalia during the resettlement interview—as if Hana was, from an official standpoint, curious, but didn’t personally give a shit what happened. Dalia planned to stare the same way until Hana fled and Charlie, realizing the party had come to an end, followed her.

  Unfortunately, things didn’t go exactly as planned. The staring made Hana so uncomfortable that she must’ve felt the need to speak, as if that would somehow release the pressure that had been mounting since Dalia had opened her door. “Can I have more tea?” asked Hana. The request was inexplicable and infuriating; her cup was still full. What was Dalia supposed to do? Pour more tea into Hana’s full cup? Watch the tea spill onto the floor?