by Anna Perera
Although he hates Shareen, he doesn’t want her to think she’s forced him to stay away. Plus the need to see Rachel is on his mind, giving him the courage and strength to get there.
Like a puppy dog, Abe grabs the ball and runs after him.
It’s a shame, Aaron thinks, that the community room’s locked at night, because it would make a good sleeping place. Although most celebrations are held outside, with people sitting on faded blankets and cushions laid out on the ground, Shareen has insisted that her party should be inside, which will make Aaron’s sudden appearance even harder to disguise.
The nearer Aaron and Abe get to the soulless concrete shed with a single strip light and a broken toilet, the sound of traditional singing becomes clearer. The door’s open and the rhythm of voices fills the night air. It’s not easy for him to step inside, but the smell of roasting meat is too strong to keep him cowering outside, where a group of men are perched on their haunches in the half-light, drinking, sparking up cigarettes, and studying the shapes on their playing cards.
Aaron sees Daniel slapping a card on the ground with a desperate look on his face. He’s more interested in winning the game than being with Shareen, his future wife.
With a quick scan of the bleak concrete room, Aaron sees that Rachel isn’t here. A hush quickly spreads from family to family until all eyes are upon him. Only this time, because an engagement celebration is in progress, there’s a faint hint of tolerance on their faces.
Aaron shudders. In one corner is an old-fashioned tape deck and a shamefaced Hassan, one of the foundry workers, is suffering the embarrassment of not being able to get it to work. At least it gives the choir in the farthest corner time to sing another traditional song. Opposite the tape deck looks like a safe place for Abe and Aaron to make for as they skirt round several people on their way to the wonky food table, which is being loaded with tubs of beans and slices of pork and chicken. Someone’s cut out a red paper heart from a magazine to decorate the faded Formica, and a few plastic roses and ribbons add to the halfhearted celebratory feeling of the room.
Hanging from the wall above the edge of the food table is a picture of the Virgin Mary surrounded by a sparkle of light. Aaron glances at it for a moment. The image makes him slightly less nervous. She feels like a friend and he stands underneath her for protection as his eyes land on Shareen. He tries hard not to make his hatred for her obvious. She is dressed in a faded green-and-blue galabeya with a lotus flower in her back-combed hair. At least she’s wearing her own dress and not Seham’s brown one, which might be newer but not any prettier. The only new things Shareen has on are a string of black beads and a thin silver bangle. She’s almost a head taller than her thin, hungry friends and looks much older. She’s smiling sweetly at everyone, but the only really happy person here is her father, who’s holding court beside the burner, slicing up meat.
He’s happy to get rid her of her, Aaron thinks. I don’t blame him.
Chapter Twelve
A Wild Stampede
As parties go, it’s a bit of a washout. People aren’t used to standing around like this. They can’t relax and would rather be outside, lolling on blankets and cushions. Aaron doesn’t perk up until Rachel finally arrives. She is wearing a gray galabeya, has her hair tied back, and is carrying a gift for Shareen in her arms—a yellow cushion embroidered with the word love in red.
Aaron wonders if she sewed it herself.
Try as he might to catch her eye, Rachel ignores him, but knowing she’s here improves the party to no end. Instead Aaron catches Sami’s eye. His family own the secondhand electrical shop and he’s watching Rachel too. Short and stocky, with a tattoo of Jesus on his hand, he’s not married and nearly twenty-five. They’ve all known each other their whole lives, but for the first time Aaron sees that Sami’s interest in Rachel is more than friendly.
The thought that Sami might want to marry Rachel sends a shiver down his spine. Sami’s unkind to his own mother. How would he treat Rachel if she became his wife?
Scooping a handful of moist beans dipped in a ball of rice from his plate to his mouth, Sami peers back at Aaron, who looks away.
Aaron notices Lijah pushing Jacob out of the door. Jacob’s a medical-waster and Lijah prefers to stay as far away from his kind as possible.
Aaron flits across the room with his plate of food, but Lijah’s already sent Jacob packing. He’s booted him out and now stands firmly with his back to the room, arms wide, feet apart to block the doorway in case Jacob tries to return. Meanwhile, Abe slips past Lijah juggling three plates of food that he’s taking home for later.
Aaron fumes. Lijah doesn’t have the guts to vent his fury on him with everyone watching, which is why he’s taking it out on Jacob instead. Rice sticks in Aaron’s throat. His fury almost burns holes in Lijah’s back. At that moment the single strip light flickers off, turning the room pitch-black.
The rising sound of grumbling and the scuttling for candles and matches force Aaron to step back, boiling with rage but still holding tight to the paper plate of messy food he’d like to have handed to Jacob.
When church candles lining the food table flare into life, the shadowy figures of Youssa and Hosi in the far corner are exposed. In that instance Aaron can see their true selves as ugly, lizardlike gargoyles. Everyone else, however, looks the same—just as they do in full light. It would be great if they could see Hosi and Youssa like I do. But they’re all minding their own sad business.
With the candles for light, there’s a softer, more party-like atmosphere, but Aaron’s still standing there eating his rice and beans alone. Only the Mebaj brothers have smiled at him. Well, to be honest, it was more like a serves you right, you idiot smirk.
Aaron glances at Shareen refilling a plastic cup with water. The lotus flower in her henna-streaked hair looks like a used tissue. She turns her head toward him, a touch of guilt in her expression. Perhaps she’s not sure whether to talk to him or not. Aaron has no desire to ever talk to her ever again. He turns his attention to Rachel, who’s chatting to a crowd of scruffy girls beside the table. Even though she’s part of the group there’s something separate about her. A kind of nice humming feeling starts up inside as he looks at her. She’s unlike anyone else in the room. It’s almost as if there’s an invisible light around her, something weird that maybe only he can feel. Until all the kids were about nine or ten, the girls and boys used to hang out together the whole time, but since then they’ve kept to their own sex. Aaron wishes he could go straight up to Rachel and her friends, but he can’t.
Without making it too obvious, he sidles toward the group of girls, who are reaching for the bowl of saffron rice on the table. The rest of the room is empty compared to the crowd gathered eagerly round the food. The recently married Seham is wearing a smart blue galabeya and has probably sold her brown engagement dress to someone else. He’s about to say hi to Seham and her hard-to-miss, huge teeth, when she looks past his shoulder and gasps as if she’s seen a snake.
A black potbellied pig is cannoning down the room, snorting madly, rolling toward the food table. The choir girls scream. People scatter, spilling food as the pig’s patchy snout swoops through dropped beans and rice with muffled thumps before twitching the table for the meat. In trying to stop him, someone pulls his short, curly tail, but the pig slams sideways into the table and the man loses his grip. People scramble to catch the church candles, which tumble to the floor, spluttering the room into darkness.
The women and children run for the door.
The older kids and men hang back, groping the wall while the pig forces the table over with a crash. Rice, meat, and beans go flying. Paper plates frisbee to the floor. Plastic cups and bottles crackle and crumple underfoot. Even the fake roses become part of the pig swill as Marris guzzles everything in his path. Finally two candles are relit and bearded men can be seen managing to grab the pig’s warm, fleshy rear for a second before it charges off again, bullet-fast, snorting fearfully and being chase
d by several men and a mad kid waving a ribbon.
A wild stampede. It’s one pig against the mob and the pig’s winning. Aaron darts forward to join the crush, but he’s no match for Marris. He backs off, envying the pig’s ability to create such havoc. In a frenzy of yelling and thumping, the fleshy force bundles across the room and Aaron sprints toward it with the same surge of chaotic, scary energy he imagines the pig’s feeling. He might as well try to catch a bomb. Aaron sticks a foot out, but the pig tramples it and skids, snorting and grunting, into the wall. Grabbed from every side, the pig vomits elastic goo, scumming up the floor. It’s the perfect end and Aaron smiles. For once he’s been let off the hook as the least-welcome guest, even if it was in a peculiar way.
An old woman with a stick stands there unmoved while everyone laughs. Her bony, bare feet drip with mustardy slop. The look on Shareen’s face confirms what everyone’s thinking: that this is the worst engagement party there’s ever been in Mokattam. Not just because of this, but also because Daniel can’t be bothered to leave his card game outside to see what damage the pig’s doing. It’s clear to everyone he doesn’t care.
By the time the pig is forcefully pushed out of the door, the community room is a battlefield which looks even scarier by the light of only one candle. Marris has turned the quiet event into a war zone, which gets worse when Hassan, doing a hopeful jig, suddenly sparks the tape deck to life and a blast of pop music bounces from the stained walls. Bounces for less than a couple of minutes, because an angry bearded elder promptly switches it off.
“Another Shareen disaster,” Rachel says, raising her eyebrows at Aaron as she peeps out from behind Farouk, the fat baker.
“Oh, I don’t know. The pig had a great time.”
They giggle for a second like children, then Rachel leaves the safety of Farouk’s bulky back and joins Aaron. It’s his high point of the party until Lijah, who’s on the prowl, sneaks up on them. Aaron eyes his shadow on the filthy wall. Weirdly, it seems to have a strength that Lijah’s body is missing. What’s real is his creepy shadow up above, while the limp creature in front of him looks weak.
“You’ve got some nerve,” Lijah says, scowling.
“Yeah?” Aaron squares up to him, but only because Rachel’s watching.
Lijah rolls his eyes at her. “Get out of the way. Where’s that idiot kid who owns the pig?”
“Marris didn’t do you any harm,” Rachel pipes up. “He was only doing what pigs do.”
“So who went and fetched it?” Scorning her, Lijah turns his attention back to Aaron—a much easier target than Rachel. “Where’s that vile kid?”
“Why don’t you see if your father’s all right instead of wondering where Abe is?” Rachel says bravely.
Her words deflate Lijah for a moment, but he’s still tempted to lash out. “Wipe that smile off your face,” he threatens Aaron.
“No!”
Lijah starts forward, then abruptly changes his mind. Distracted by the whining sound behind him, he spies Shareen with a deathly pale face ripping the limp lotus flower from her hair and marching angrily to the door. They crane their necks to watch her go. That’s it, the party’s over, and it feels like a thousand years could go by before there’s another one. It’s especially bad because Sami’s been filming the whole thing with his cell phone and Shareen knows he’s going to show it to everyone.
“That kid’s going to pay for this,” Lijah says, stomping after Shareen as if it’s up to him to save the day.
He’s slowly followed by the remaining kids and families, who drift from the room, disappointed by the early finish.
“Who does he think he is?” Rachel says to Aaron. “Someone important.” Aaron sighs.
“What are you going to do?” Rachel asks.
“I don’t know. Find somewhere to sleep, I guess.”
“I reckon Father Peter won’t mind if you sleep on one of the concrete pews,” Rachel suggests.
The priest? Aaron suddenly remembers he asked to talk to him tomorrow. Well, that’s not going to happen, which means he can’t afford to bed down at the church in case he bumps into him in the morning. Aaron catches the white flashing of Rachel’s almond eyes and realizes she’s thinking the same thing. “Might not be a good idea, then?” she says. Aaron remembers the stash of hidden perfume bottles.
“No.” Aaron wishes he could explain. “Are you going to check on the ponies now?”
“Suppose so.”
He knows it’s on her way home and her three sisters have already left, along with her father, his brother, and their wives. “I’ll walk you. Don’t worry—no one will see you with me now that it’s dark.”
She nods and they’re about to go when Jacob emerges next to them as they step outside. In the half-light his eyes are strangely huge.
“I was hiding round the back. Wasn’t that a joke?”
No! No! Not now! Aaron squirms away from him. He could strangle Jacob as he slips between them, joining their stride past the card players, who are handing round bottles of beer. Go away.
Daniel clinks the coins in his fist and waves at them. He’s won, but it’s not enough. The cards are again shuffled and cut, bringing a hiss of pleasure to his wet lips.
Lifting her hair gently from her neck, Rachel mutters, “Shareen’s in the lion’s den.”
“Aren’t we all?” Aaron trembles with fear. That’s exactly where he is—in the lion’s den.
“Do you think we become stars when we die?” Jacob’s determined to break into their chat as they move away from the darkening concrete units.
“Yes,” Rachel and Aaron say at the same time.
They smile, but a sickening feeling that Jacob’s going to ruin everything takes shape in Aaron, while his question stays written in the night sky forever. He glances up at a billion reasons to believe in something bigger than himself, then shrinks at the overpowering truth and secrets of the universe. He needs to find his destiny in Mokattam first.
“It’s the same sky for everyone,” Jacob says. “They can’t wreck that.”
“We’re going to see the ponies.” Aaron secretly half- winks. “Are you going home?”
“Nah. Not yet.”
Flinging his head back, Jacob pauses to allow the blanket of twinkling lights in the sky to fall on him while Aaron gropes for an excuse to get rid of him.
“Maybe they’ll take Cairo’s trash to the moon one day,” Rachel says.
Aaron fixes on Rachel. A ton of wordless emotions crowd him out. If she stayed here for the next half an hour, it would light up the night brighter than any star. Almost as if she can read what he’s thinking, Rachel turns to go.
“Forget the ponies. I’m going home. See ya.”
As she walks away, a dark mound at Aaron’s feet suddenly comes alive with maggots.
Chapter Thirteen
Hope
Hope is all that’s left over the next few days as Aaron lies on a patch of land behind the ramshackle pony yard, staring at the sky without seeing it. His eyes hurt from crying and the hours spent clawing through trash for stale food to eat are taking their toll. The old aches in his toe, knee, and elbow twinge slightly as he remembers Lijah pushing him off the cart.
His face is thin and drawn. He can’t sleep from worrying about bumping into Father Peter and suffering the talk that’s coming any day soon. He can’t avoid him forever. The priest is bound to catch Aaron on his way to the wall.
The annoying sound of ponies stamping the scrubby earth wakes Aaron long before dawn and since he’s been here, hiding out, Rachel’s become cool and a bit strange. Yesterday she didn’t say a word to him. She blushed, gave him some bread, and kept blinking at the empty trough and rubbing her arm, as if he made her skin itch. Then she turned and ran away, and her fluttering feet made his body throb. Each day it’s getting harder and harder to survive; he’s in trouble with the community, and now Rachel is increasingly distant. She pities him. He can feel it.
Perhaps someone’s found out
she’s helping him. Aaron sighs. If the news gets around it will do untold harm to her reputation. The thought turns his stomach. Not only that but he’s scoured the village hour after hour for somewhere else to stay and the only place on offer is one that’s bringing him out in a sweat. What haunts his mind now isn’t Lijah but images of being elbow-deep in leaking tubes of blood and dirty bandages.
For the last year, Noha, Jacob’s mother, has been trying to persuade others to help Jacob collect the medical waste. She has put the idea to Aaron several times, but he’s refused. Even with the torment of Lijah and Hosi, it’s a job Aaron was too terrified to imagine and never in his wildest dreams expected to take up. Because girls and women aren’t allowed on the carts, he knew, long ago, what Noha was angling at when she said, “Sometimes fortune plays games with us and brings us the things we want the least.” Noha would prefer to go into the city with Jacob instead of staying at home.
“Did the ponies have a drink before they were tied to the carts this morning?” Rachel shouts, interrupting his thoughts.
“Yeah. Yeah.” Aaron jumps up.
“You sure?” Only half believing him, she quickly unties the gate and goes to check. The water trough is as dry as a bone and the early sun is burning into the pits of the empty basin. “You didn’t fill it, did you?”
“I did.” He runs to help her. “But you know sometimes how thirsty they get.”
“There’s always a little water left. The ponies know to leave some for later. I would have done it myself if you hadn’t promised.” She frowns.
There’s nothing Aaron can say. He lied. He let her down. She won’t ask him again.
“I’ve got to … do stuff.” Aaron nods. “I’ll catch you later.”
Guilt weighs down on him like a ton of bricks as he creeps away with a pounding heart. You dumb fool. Why didn’t you get up when the ponies were neighing? What was the point in lying? Why didn’t you say you were too tired to wake up?