The Lost Letter from Morocco
Page 21
Addy sees Amine’s eyes shift towards Fatima, who’s staring down at her Crocs, the corners of her mouth lifted into a smile. Addy clicks the shutter.
An hour later they reach a wide clearing at the base of the mountain foothills. Tufts of bright green grass sprout from red sandstone crevices in the hills. Rocks line a pool of water so clear Addy can make out the markings on the stones below. Pink and white oleanders bloom along the banks. At the far end of the pool by the base of the hills, the arches of an ancient stone aqueduct stand in water, orphaned from the banks on either side. The sun is high in the sky and the sunlight sparkles off the ripples of the pool.
‘It’s beautiful. Zwina.’
Fatima’s round face breaks into a beaming smile. ‘Zwina.’
‘Where does the river start? From the mountains?’
‘No, it’s here.’ Amine points to the pool. ‘The water for the waterfalls come up from the ground underneath.’
Addy scans the glass-like surface. ‘It’s hard to believe this little pool will turn into the waterfalls just a few kilometres away.’
‘Yes, but the tourists they don’t come here often.’ Amine sets down Addy’s tripod and rests his hands on his hips as he gazes at the aqueduct. ‘It’s so far for them to walk. Imazighen people don’t mind about the source. There’s no olives here. So it stays quiet like this.’
Addy sits on a large rock and gestures to Fatima to stand in front of the pool. As she focuses the camera on Fatima’s face, Amine shouts out in Tamazight. Fatima blushes and giggles as Addy clicks a run of images. Fatima laughing by the pool, her face transformed into beauty by Amine’s words.
‘Go next to her, Amine. I’ll take a picture of both of you.’
Amine pushes a stone into the water with the tip of his Adidas trainer. ‘It might be Omar will be angry for me to be with Fatima.’
‘Don’t worry about Omar. These pictures are for my memories. I want to remember this lovely day here with the two of you.’
Amine stands awkwardly beside Fatima. He examines the ground as if it holds the answer to some ancient dilemma. Fatima leans over and whispers. Amine grins and looks up as Addy clicks the shutter.
They hurry over to Addy and lean over the image on the camera screen.
‘You go with Fatima, Adi,’ Amine says. ‘I will take a picture for your memories.’
They spend the next few minutes taking photos: Addy and Fatima; Addy and Amine – a little crooked and out of focus; and one of them all as Addy clicks the photo with her extension cable.
‘I want to take some pictures of the aqueduct. Make sure Fatima doesn’t fall into the water.’
She looks back at Fatima and Amine, sitting together on the big rock. Their laughter floats like feathers on the fresh mountain air.
On the walk back to Zitoune, Addy dawdles behind, photographing sheep on the hillsides, donkeys saddled in colourful blankets tethered to olive trees, red poppies springing out of the meadow grass, and nimble Imazighen boys playing with hoops and sticks by the river. Amine and Fatima stroll on ahead, their heads bent together in conversation, their footsteps slow on the dusty path.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Zitoune, Morocco – May 2009
The rooster’s ear-splitting crows jar Addy out of a deep sleep. Her face is squashed into her pillow. She reaches over to Omar’s side, but her fingers find only an indentation in the mattress. The mosque’s megaphone squeals to life. The muezzin sings out the dawn call to prayer, the rippling sounds blaring through the open window. She reaches for Omar’s pillow and folds it over her head.
She’s sinking into sleep, when a car’s horn rattles her awake. Beep beep beep. Beep beep beep. BEEEPPP. Beep beep beep. Beep beep beep. BEEEPPP. She tosses the pillow onto the rug and untangles herself from the sheets and mosquito net. Pulling her kaftan over her head, she pads through the house and out to the veranda.
‘Allô, Turquoise.’ Yassine leans out of his car window and waves, smoke from a cigarette threading through the air.
‘Yassine? Where’s Omar?’
Yassine smiles a slow, heavy-lidded smile. ‘He ask me to pick you up.’
A cool breeze wraps around Addy’s body, sending goose bumps up her arms. She rubs her naked arms.
‘Pick me up? Why?’
Yassine’s eyes flick over her wrinkled kaftan. ‘It might be there is a problem with his grandmother.’
‘Jedda? She’s ill?’
‘It might be. She’s so older. Maybe she will die.’
‘What do you mean she might die? Do we need to get her to a hospital? Where’s Omar? Is he with her?’
‘Darling, darling, don’t worry.’ Yassine exhales a trail of smoke. ‘Maybe the grandmother of Omar is okay. He just say for me to pick you up.’
‘Is Jedda okay? Maybe I should call Omar.’
‘As you like, Turquoise, but she is okay. I’m sure about it.’ He presses his hand against his chest. ‘I am your servant.’
‘Don’t call me that.’
‘No problem, darling. I call you Turquoise only when we are alone. It can be the secret of you and me.’
‘I don’t need any secrets with you. Be careful, Yassine.’
Yassine touches his hand to his lips. ‘I am always careful, Turquoise. I am more clever than Omar thinks.’
Omar waves from the concrete terrace in front of the police station. He and the stocky, middle-aged policeman with a thick grey moustache sit in white plastic garden chairs either side of a white plastic table drinking Coke. The policeman throws a cigarette stub onto the concrete and stubs it out with his black boot.
Yassine beeps the horn and steers the car sharply into the dirt car park. Omar leaps down the steps and jogs over.
‘Omar, is Jedda okay?’
‘Yes, of course. Mashi mushkil.’
Omar leans into Yassine’s window and speaks to him in Tamazight. Addy glances up at the terrace and catches the policeman staring at her. He stands, swigs the dregs of Coke from the can and steps back into the building.
Yassine hands Omar the keys and climbs over the gear stick into the passenger seat as Omar slides into the driver’s seat.
Addy frowns. ‘What are you doing?’
‘I made a surprise for you, darling. Yassine teach me to drive. It’s the reason I been going out early in the morning.’
Yassine loops his hand over Omar’s headrest. ‘He drives well, Turq … Adi. I’m a good teacher.’
‘Really?’
Omar’s eyes meet hers in the mirror. ‘Yes, for sure, darling.’
‘Jedda’s not sick?’
‘No. She’s okay.’
‘Hmmph.’ Addy sits back in the seat and fans her face with the end of the white tagelmust she’s draped around her neck. ‘Don’t run anybody over.’
‘Darling, if I run over somebody, it’s his fate.’
Omar grinds the gears, slowing down to avoid a group of boys on donkeys outside the busy market square. Flimsy stalls covered with torn scraps of advertising banners cluster around a dusty patch of earth behind the permanent butchers’ and grocers’ stalls.
‘Look. It’s Fatima and Zaina.’
‘What? Where?’
Addy points towards the girls. ‘Over by the popcorn stall. They look like they’re arguing.’
The car jerks violently to a stop. He thrusts open the car door and steps out into the gravel road.
‘Omar! We’re in the middle of the road.’
‘Taboune omok.’
Yassine laughs, sending fine strands of tobacco from the cigarette he’s rolling over the dashboard.
‘Okay, okay.’ Omar climbs into the car and slams the door. ‘We go, but I must speak to her later. She knows she doesn’t go to the market except if my mum or I’m with her.’
‘What do you m—’
‘Adi. It’s not England here. You don’t understand the situation well.’
Addy slumps against the seat. She certainly didn’t understand the situation a
t all. She’d do everything she could to get Fatima out of the house as often as possible. If she was going to be involved with Omar, he’d have to change his attitude.
The car judders forwards. Omar leans on the horn. Fatima and Zaina glance at the car. Omar waggles his finger at Fatima as he steers past the market.
Addy catches Zaina’s eye. Omar’s words echo in Addy’s mind. It’s not England here. You don’t understand the situation well. Then it dawns on her. In Zaina’s eyes she’s not a tourist, or a traveller. To Zaina she’s much worse. She’s an intruder.
The car bumps over the track she’d walked with Amine and Fatima the day before. At the river, Omar steers the car left up a hill and parks it amid mounds of gravel and sand. Weeds grow from the sand and bites have been taken out of the gravel where someone’s helped themselves to the crushed stone. The excavated ground is rimmed in knee-high concrete walls with rusty iron supports protruding from the four corners. Moss spreads over the concrete blocks like a carpet.
Adjusting her tagelmust, Addy follows Omar out of the car. Grabbing an iron support, he leaps up onto the low wall and surveys the foundations.
‘You like it?’
‘What is it?’
‘It will be a guest house for tourists. From the roof you will see the river and the mountains all around. I built it on the hill so if the river floods it’s no problem.’
The Renault’s engine revs and Yassine beeps the horn. He waves through the window as he reverses the car down the hill.
‘I’m glad he’s gone,’ Addy says.
‘Why?’
‘He makes me nervous.’
Omar frowns. ‘He made you trouble in the car?’
‘No, no. It was fine. Never mind.’ Addy hears the false note in her voice, like she’s pranged the wrong key on a piano. She slips her hand into Omar’s. ‘Show me the guest house.’
Omar gives her a lingering kiss. ‘I wanted to kiss you ever since the police station, darling, but it’s not possible to do it with everybody watching.’
‘Mashi mushkil, habibi.’
‘You are like the flower in my desert, habibati. I am the rain for you.’
‘You do have a way with words.’
‘It’s easy for me, darling. You are the beautiful white flower in the garden of my heart.’
‘Okay, okay. You’re the camel in my desert.’
‘That’s not so romantic.’
‘I’m not a poet like you.’
‘A lady teach me well.’
‘A lady?’
Omar hesitates. ‘When I was a boy there was a lady in the village. She wrote poems well. She read them to me many times. The words made my heart buzz. Anyway, never mind for that.’ He pulls Addy up onto the concrete wall. ‘Come look where the house of Adi will be.’
‘The house of Adi?’
‘Why not? Dar Adi. It sounds nice.’
They jump down onto the rubble-strewn earth. As they walk around the perimeter, Omar kicks at Coke cans and beer bottles.
‘I feel bad that I didn’t build anything yet.’
‘What’s stopping you?’
‘It’s very expensive. I must pay an architect to make the plans so I can have a licence to build it. All the time it’s papers, papers and dirhams, dirhams.’
‘How much does an architect cost?’
‘A lot. Like seven hundred euros. Maybe one thousand.’ They sit on the concrete block wall. ‘Maybe I can come to live with you in England and earn well there. Then I can spend the money in Morocco to build a good house for us and make a good business.’
‘Come to live with me in England?’ Philippa’s warnings ricochet around Addy’s head like a bullet. He’s probably just after a passport. Just wait till he asks you for money. He will, you know. They all do.
Omar shrugs. ‘Why not?’
‘The weather’s terrible and London’s crowded with people. I don’t think you’d like it.’
‘If you’re there, I would love it, Adi, one hundred per cent.’
‘A thousand euros is a lot of money.’
‘I know, darling. It’s why I stopped building it.’
Addy chews her lip. Omar worked so hard. It was sad to see his dream crumbling and rusting in the olive grove. She didn’t have much, but maybe she could loan him something. She’d sell her old Peugeot when she got home. She didn’t really need a car in London. It wasn’t like Omar’d asked her for the money.
‘What if I give you some money towards the architect? I could possibly manage about five hundred pounds.’ It made sense. He could build the guest house and she’d have a place to stay with him when she visited. No need for him to come to England.
‘You don’t have to do that. It must be I do it for myself, even if it take a long time.’
‘I want to do it.’
The furrow between Omar’s eyes deepens. ‘It’s a big imposition on you.’
‘No, I want to do it. Then we’d have a private place to stay when I visit. It’s perfect.’
Omar presses his fingers against his eyes. When he looks at her, his eyes are wet.
‘Thank you, Adi. Nobody ever did something like that for me before in all my life. It’s always me who take care of everybody.’
She puts her arms around his shoulders and kisses his wet cheeks. ‘I’m glad to do it, habibi.’
Philippa must never know.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Zitoune, Morocco – May 2009
Addy follows Omar through a flimsy brown-painted door into the stable yard behind Aicha’s house. A movement near the stables catches her eye. A glimpse of a red headscarf? The wooden door in the clay wall of the stable bounces on its hinges and Jedda’s black-and-white cat slips into the stable.
‘Was that Lamia?’
Omar shakes his head. ‘Lamia? She live in the mountains.’
‘I thought I saw her go in that door with Jedda’s cat.’
‘Nobody goes in there except my grandmother. She have a big key. Her medicines are in there. Even my mother is not permitted to go without the permission of my grandmother.’ Omar pushes open the heavy wooden door into the house.
‘Allô? Omar?’ Omar’s Uncle Rachid pops his head around the door to the living room.
‘Uncle Rachid? What are you doing here?’
Rachid emerges, smiling broadly. He’s wearing a crumpled grey suit and pointed yellow babouches. Omar hugs his uncle, kissing him several times on his cheeks.
‘Why didn’t you tell me you were coming here, Uncle? Did Fatima take care of you well? You had tea?’
‘Yes, yes. Tea and cake and everything. You are well, Madame Adi? Your family is well?’ He gestures towards the living room. ‘Come, we are making a nice celebration.’
‘Which celebration? You came with my aunt and the baby?’
‘No, no. Nadia is at home with our little daughter.’
They follow Rachid into the living room. Farouk sits opposite Aicha in a long white tunic over yellow babouches and a white prayer cap. On the dirt floor next to his feet sits a large bamboo birdcage. A small bright green budgerigar sits on a perch.
The round wooden table is covered with a floral plastic tablecloth, and glasses of steaming mint tea are laid out with plates of cookies, cake, dates, bread, bowls of thick amber honey and fat black olives. Farouk munches on a cookie, his beard catching the crumbs like a net. When he sees Addy, he drops the half-eaten cookie on the table and barks at Rachid in Arabic.
Jedda shuffles into the room, the black-and-white cat slinking in behind her, and stops short in front of Farouk. She stamps her stick on the plastic mat and gestures to him as she remonstrates shrilly.
‘What’s going on?’
‘Farouk doesn’t want you to come in the room. My grandmother is unhappy for it.’
Jedda settles beside Aicha and reaches for a glass of tea. She glares at Farouk with her good blue eye. Rachid speaks to Omar in Arabic. Farouk tugs at the sleeve of Omar’s denim jacket and fills the air w
ith his objections as he jabs his finger at Addy.
Omar takes Addy’s arm and steers her towards the door. ‘Adi, we go out.’
‘What’s going on?’ Addy asks when they’re in the courtyard. ‘Where’s Fatima?’
‘She’s in the room of my mother.’
‘Is Lamia with her?’
‘No, Lamia’s not here. I told you before.’
‘What’s Farouk doing here?’
He presses his fingers against his temple. ‘Farouk wants to marry Fatima.’
‘What?’
‘Nadia saw the photo you took of Fatima when we were at the Hassan II Mosque in Casa and she told Farouk about her. He needs a wife for his children. He brought Fatima a bird for a present. For sure my uncle paid for it. Farouk wants to have the wedding quick.’
Addy rakes through her memories of that day. Sitting on the grass near the mosque. Flicking through the camera images. Nadia raising her hand in the air to indicate how much Fatima has grown. Her camera. Her pictures. What has she done?
‘What does Fatima say about this?’
‘She doesn’t want to marry him.’
‘You said she’s said no before. So it’s fine, isn’t it?’
‘It’s a big problem this time, because Farouk is the brother of my aunt. It hurts the honour of my uncle Rachid if Fatima doesn’t marry Farouk.’
A vision of Fatima shrouded in a black niqab flashes into Addy’s mind. ‘What are you going to do?’
He presses the palms of his hands against his eyes. ‘I don’t know. It might be good if you go back to your house. I must talk to Farouk.’
Addy knocks on Aicha’s bedroom door. ‘Fatima? C’est Adi.’
The bed creaks. The shuffle of babouches against the concrete floor. The door opens and Fatima stands there in flowered flannelette pyjamas, her face puffy and wet, strands of hair plastered to her cheeks. Fatima opens her arms to Addy and bursts into tears. Addy shuts the door and when the crying settles into soft chokes, she leads Fatima over to the bed.
‘Talk to me, Fatima.’
The words tumble out of Fatima in a jumble of French and Tamazight. How Rachid and Farouk had arrived in the morning. How Farouk has asked Aicha for permission to marry her. How Aicha’s thrilled to have Fatima marry into the extended family and is already planning the wedding. How they’re just waiting for Omar’s permission to make it all official.