Where the Streets Had a Name

by Randa Abdel-Fattah

  ‘His first wife, Lara, was thirty-nine, had long hair down to her waist and magnificent brown eyes. The new bride was Fatima from Nablus and she had blue eyes, fair hair and was eighteen years old. She was an orphan and had been raised by her great-aunt. Lara had not even a pumpkin seed’s worth of pity. She was furious and vowed revenge. Lara insisted on attending the wedding. She didn’t leave the dance floor and danced around the bride and groom, clapping vigorously, performing ululations, the zaghareet. She laughed and cheered and we all thought she had gone mad. That the donkey had finally turned her into a lunatic.

  ‘What I remember is her chewing down hard on a piece of gum the whole night. The louder she clapped, the more her jaw worked, as though all her anger was being channelled into gnawing that piece of chewing gum between her teeth. But a plan was swimming in her head, we later learned.

  ‘A week or so after the wedding she went into the kitchen in the middle of the night and cooked lentil soup. I know you do not like lentil soup but that is beside the point. For hours she let it boil and boil. Finally, it spewed over the edges of the pot, a horrible, rotting smell climbing out of it. Do you know that smell?’

  I nodded, scrunching my nose up.

  ‘As the bride and groom lay asleep, Lara snuck into their room and poured a trail of the sticky brown lentil mess right under the bride’s bottom. A little smudged on the bride’s white satin nightgown and Lara paused to grin to herself.’

  ‘How do you know she paused to grin to herself?’

  Sitti Zeynab frowned. ‘Lara has retold this story so many times we all feel we were in the room with her. Anyway, wouldn’t you pause and grin to yourself if you were getting revenge on your donkey husband?’

  ‘I suppose. But I feel sorry for Fatima. It’s not her fault.’

  Sitti Zeynab shrugged. ‘That’s life. Now let me continue. Lara left the sleeping couple and went to bed. She awoke some hours later to the sound of her husband and his new bride screeching with horror. She rushed to the room and was delighted with the scene that greeted her. Her husband stood pointing in disgust at the bride.

  ‘“The bride has soiled herself!” he exclaimed over and over again. And the poor bride looked behind and, apparently too intimidated – and stupid in my opinion – to accuse Lara, covered her face with shame.

  ‘The donkey divorced Fatima and she returned to Nablus, a divorcee with blue eyes and fair hair. From then on Lara apparently only had to say jump and her husband would ask how high. And that is the story of Abo Ades and you must now swear never to tell your mother you heard about it from me.’

  The driver suddenly slams his foot on the brake, our path cut by a bored-looking pony lazily ambling its way across the road before it negotiates its large rear end down through the sloping backyard of a house.

  David and Molly turn around in their seats to face Samy and me.

  ‘It’s beautiful, isn’t it?’ David says, referring to the view of Jerusalem.

  I nod shyly. Samy looks at David and then impolitely averts his eyes.

  ‘Where are you going?’ Molly asks.

  ‘To Jerusalem,’ I reply. ‘To my grandmother’s village.’ They want to hear more so I tell them about our plans, conveniently omitting the part about our families having no idea where we are.

  Samy decides to provide further embellishment by adding that our families have ‘sent us’.

  ‘But do you have the papers to enter?’ David asks.

  ‘Bin kalb to the papers,’ Samy says coolly. ‘We will get in.’

  I dig out a photograph of Sitti Zeynab from my bag. ‘It was taken the day I was born,’ I explain, passing it to them. ‘That bundle she’s holding, the one with the monkey face? That’s me.’ I smile.

  Molly politely comments that Sitti Zeynab looks sweet, despite the fact that my grandmother stares stony-faced into the camera, as though not smiling will attach an air of dignity and status to her portrait.

  ‘If she met you she would damn you and your ancestors to hell,’ I say, giggling.

  They raise their eyebrows. ‘How flattering,’ David says.

  ‘But she doesn’t mean it. She told me so herself. She says we all laugh the same . . . Do you want to come with us? You said you were going to Jerusalem.’

  Without attempting any subtlety, Samy hits me in the side and asks David and Molly to put their fingers in their ears as he wants to talk about them but can’t do so given their command of Arabic.

  ‘Oh, so you don’t trust us?’ Molly asks, her mouth twitching.

  Samy shrugs but doesn’t reply. His brashness never ceases to amaze me. Even more amazing is the graciousness with which Molly and David raise their fingers to their ears. They look at us, index fingers wedged into the sides of their heads, lopsided grins on their faces.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ I ask quietly.

  ‘We’ve come this far on our own. We don’t need adults. Let alone ones who could be agents.’

  ‘They’re not agents, Samy. I like them and they can help us.’

  We argue in hushed tones for several more moments, Samy submitting the basis upon which he considers them to be undercover spies, I throwing him a long list of synonyms for the word paranoid.

  He huffs and puffs. I cross my arms over my chest and David and Molly look on from their sound-proofed positions. I win the argument because Samy can be stubborn with everybody in the world except me. Once I’ve assured him that I’ll report any spy-like activity to him, we agree to invite them and I motion for David and Molly to remove their fingers from their ears.

  ‘So what’s the problem?’ David asks good-naturedly.

  ‘If you’d like to . . . if you’re not busy . . . you’re welcome to come with us to Jerusalem.’

  They’re happy to accompany us. I beam. Samy grunts.

  The service stops at a taxi junction and we all disembark. Marwan nods goodbye to Raghib and Grace and shakes David’s and Molly’s hands.

  Then he turns to Samy and me, his earphones still dangling down his chest, his oud case propped under his arm.

  ‘There’s no war in music,’ he says softly. ‘Remember that, yes?’ He winks at us and walks away, his pointy leather shoes kicking up the dusty road.

  We wait for a service to take us to El-Eizarya. We stand at the top of a dusty incline lined with white limestone houses and apartment blocks, the flat roofs decorated with television antennas and water tanks. While we wait, I announce that we need to find a phone and call our families. Molly offers us her mobile telephone. Samy and I stand to the side and I call home first. Jihan answers and my stomach lurches with both the fear of being caught and ordered to return, and a longing to be back in the safety of my home.

  ‘Jihan? It’s me. How is Sitti?’

  ‘Where are you? If you’re playing with Samy I’ll throttle you when you get home! Mama and Baba leave me in charge and you decide to come home late from school!’

  After I assuage her anger, and feed her a story about dabka practice, she tells me that Sitti Zeynab has just arrived home.

  ‘Is she okay?’

  ‘Yes, just weak and tired.’

  I tell Jihan to reassure Sitti Zeynab that I have a surprise for her but Jihan swiftly cuts me off as Ahmad is calling her mobile telephone.

  Samy’s conversation with Amto Christina is much quicker. He simply reassures her that dabka practice will still allow him to make it in time for volunteering at church and then he hangs up.

  ‘I doubt you’ll make it in time.’

  He grins. ‘Yes, I know.’

  ‘We’re mad. Look at the time. It’s past four. We haven’t even entered Jerusalem yet.’ I raise my head to the sky and sigh. ‘Even if we make it to Sitti Zeynab’s village and somehow manage to get back, we won’t be home before night.’ I shudder. ‘Do you know something? I think I’m more terrified of how Mama will react than I am of getting caught.’

  ‘You have a point,’ Samy says thoughtfully. ‘Your mum is scary. But so what? Don’t tell
me you want to back out now?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘Then what are you talking about?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘About your mum? What do you mean?’

  ‘I’m just telling you how I feel.’

  Samy looks bewildered. ‘Why?’

  ‘Oh for God’s sake,’ I say, walking back to David and Molly. ‘You really can be an idiot.’

  ‘I’ll never understand girls,’ he calls out.

  Chapter SIXTEEN

  We board yet another service. The driver speeds down the streets and then takes El-Eizarya road. Wasim had explained that El-Eizarya’s main road connects to the Jerusalem-Jericho road and that within minutes we can reach the Old City. My heart skips a beat as I realise how close we are. What had seemed an impossibility only hours ago is now so close I can practically feel the soil running through my fingers.

  I wonder what Sitti Zeynab’s house will look like after all these years. Will the village itself lie neglected and homesick for its owners?

  We drive on. David doesn’t like silence. Molly doesn’t seem to mind it. Samy and I never feel the need to make conversation unless we have something to say.

  David turns to face us and asks us to tell him about our lives. I wonder where to start. Mama says she felt me kick her in her stomach when she was just five months into her pregnancy, although Baba attributes the alleged incident to a late-night plate of falafel. I might tell them about the time I tripped over in a dabka performance at school and ran off the stage in tears. Baba took me and my friends for ice cream afterwards and boasted to them how proud he was of me. I might tell them about the time Mama accidentally burped loudly when Ahmad and his parents visited to ask for Jihan’s hand in marriage and then blamed the offensive belch on me. Instead, though, I tell them about Jihan’s wedding plans and how Mama has started drugging Jihan to prepare her for marriage.

  ‘What do you mean, drugging?’ David asks in shock. Molly stares at me, her mouth open.

  I explain that I’ve seen Jihan swallow a tiny tablet every evening and that Mama has been going to great lengths to remind Jihan to take the tablet at the same time each day. ‘But Sitti Zeynab disapproves,’ I adds. ‘She says it’s silly to wait and that it’s easier to cope when you’re young. I don’t know, though. I suppose it depends on the illness. They refuse to speak to me about it and insist I should stay out of adult affairs, which is ridiculous because as much as Jihan annoys me, she’s my sister. I mean, I have the right to know why marrying Ahmad is making her sick.’

  David and Molly exchange a look that makes me suspect there’s laughter dancing in their eyes. Samy offers the opinion that if Jihan is so sick and requires daily medication then perhaps she should not be trying to lose weight. ‘She should preserve her energy.’

  David then moves on to Samy, not realising he would have more luck eliciting information from a statue. The only person Samy speaks to is me. And even then we rarely discuss anything personal. Samy meets David’s eager friendliness with aloofness. ‘I like soccer.’

  It’s painful to watch David try to draw Samy further. Of course I know that Samy isn’t going to reveal too much to people he thinks may be Shabak agents. What I don’t know is that David is aware of the problem too.

  ‘We aren’t agents, Samy,’ he says in a gentle tone.

  ‘Agents?’ Molly cries. ‘Huh!’ She slaps her hand on her thigh and laughs loudly.

  Samy is outraged and his face flushes cherry.

  ‘You were supposed to block your ears! You cheated!’

  ‘Sorry, but I clean my ears regularly, Samy,’ David says, grinning. ‘There wasn’t enough wax in them to block out your voice.’

  Samy folds his arms across his chest and purses his lips in anger. ‘Well I’m entitled to think what I want.’

  ‘Samy,’ Molly says kindly, ‘you can trust us.’

  David retrieves an envelope of photographs from his bag. ‘Here, have a look at these.’

  Samy takes the envelope and slowly flips through the photos. I lean close to him to look as well. In the first photo, a bulldozer is parked in front of a house. David is lying down on the ground in front of it with four other people. Flipping over, David is being dragged by a soldier. Next: Molly and David are eating at the table of a Palestinian family, everybody grinning at the camera. Then: a group shot of Palestinian children, men and women, and David and Molly, arms all linked as they stand in front of Al-Rowwad Cultural and Theatre Training Centre in Aida camp. Last: Molly stands in between a soldier and a man in a keffiyeh, Molly obviously in an argument with the soldier, her hands in the air, her crazy curls lifted in the wind.

  Samy hands David the photos back. ‘They’re . . . nice . . .’ he says in a subdued voice, avoiding eye contact.

  They’re not just nice. They’re marvellous.

  ‘So tell us something about your life,’ I say to Molly.

  She tilts her head to the side and grins. ‘Hmm . . . okay. Well, I love chocolate. I write a to-do list every morning and usually do nothing on it. And I have a gorgeous dog called Missy.’

  ‘Where do you live?’ Samy asks.

  ‘New York.’

  ‘Are you and David married?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Where did you meet?’

  ‘Was it love at first sight?’

  ‘Is David an atheist?’

  ‘What do Jews do on the Sabbath?’

  Molly and David laugh.

  ‘Slow down,’ Molly says.

  ‘Okay, my question first!’ Samy says.

  ‘Well, we met at a friend’s birthday party.’

  ‘I liked Molly’s curly hair. It was crazy. It was like at first sight.’

  ‘Oh no, mister,’ Molly cries, playfully hitting his arm, ‘you’re not getting off that easily. You confessed to me that you were besotted the first time you laid eyes on me.’

  ‘There’s a rule about repeating that kind of information, you know.’

  ‘Where was the party?’ I ask.

  ‘It was a beach party in California. David was wearing the funniest clothes. A Hawaiian floral shirt with bright yellow board shorts, socks and runners! He had his hair in a ponytail like it is now but he was wearing a headband.’

  ‘Why were you dressed like a girl?’ Samy asks incredulously.

  ‘Hey! Everybody said I looked very trendy.’

  Molly grins at us. ‘Well, he did look very cool. Weird, but trendy.’

  ‘Have you got children?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well you’d better hurry,’ Samy says flatly. ‘You’re already pretty old.’

  David laughs. ‘Hey, we’re in our forties.’

  ‘So you see my point,’ Samy says solemnly.

  Suddenly, Molly cries out: ‘Oh no!’

  The driver swerves to the side of the road and turns the ignition off. Arching my neck, I look ahead. The stretch of road has come to a sudden halt. A two-metre-high concrete wall, topped with rolls of barbed wire and stretching as far as the eye can see from right to left, cuts across the bitumen, blocking the way in a colossal concrete T intersection. About half-a-dozen service cabs and taxis are parked haphazardly in front of the wall, the drivers leaning against their vehicles, smoking and gossiping.

  ‘For God’s sake . . .’ David mutters, shaking his head in despair.

  ‘Now what do we do?’ Samy groans.

  The driver has opened the door and the other passengers disembark. When the four of us are still in our seats he turns around and says: ‘Come on. Last stop.’

  ‘But what do we do?’ I ask, standing up hastily. ‘We want to go to Jerusalem.’

  The driver lets out a harsh laugh and points out the window. ‘As you see.’

  ‘But this road is supposed to take us to the Jerusalem-Jericho road,’ Samy says.

  The thick eyebrows on the driver’s round, sunburnt face arch in surprise. ‘What are you talking about? That time is long gone.’

 
‘But we thought this service would take us,’ Samy says.

  ‘What did I just say?’ the driver cries impatiently. ‘The Wall is here now! Yallah, I have to get to an appointment.’

  We walk towards the convoy of service cabs and taxis. I glance at the stretch of Wall alongside us. It’s obviously incomplete, the vertical blocks unequal in length. Rocks, concrete blocks and graffitied boulders are strewn haphazardly in front of it. The ground is dusty and grey, rubbish and building debris lying around. The red spray-painted words El-Eizarya Ghetto are splattered on a concrete slab.

  As we approach the cluster of taxis and service cabs, a flurry of drivers flocks to us, their cries filling the air.

  ‘I have airconditioning!’

  ‘My cab is clean!’

  ‘Discount! I’ll give you a discount!’

  They encircle us, their eyes pleading with us to choose them, like hungry squawking seagulls.

  David holds his hands up and motions for them to be quiet. ‘We want to get to Jerusalem. How do we get there?’

  ‘It depends. What passes do you have?’

  ‘We’re here on foreign passports but we’re travelling with our two friends here,’ David says.

  Impressed by David’s fluent Arabic, the drivers give him a winning smile.

  ‘Well, you’ll pass through the checkpoints easily. But are they West Bankers?’

  ‘Yes. But we want to travel with them.’

  ‘I will take you, my friend,’ one says.

  ‘No, I will,’ another insists.

  ‘Ya zalami, just tell us how to get there first!’ Molly says, her use of colloquial Arabic making the drivers all beam and coo with excitement. ‘Tell us exactly how to get there,’ she says. ‘No surprises.’

  After lavishing praise on her Arabic, one man says: ‘You drive to the checkpoint at the settlement of Ma’ale Adumim. Then you turn around and head to the A Zaim checkpoint. Then to French Hill and then to East Jerusalem. But these two kids won’t get in.’

  ‘Oof!’ Samy exclaims, throwing his hands in the air. ‘I am car sick from all this travelling!’