Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know

by Samira Ahmed

  Alexandre races toward me, carrying a screwdriver, pliers, and a small crowbar. The sheen of sweat on his face somehow doesn’t diminish his cuteness. His wild-eyed determination heightens my own excitement amidst the bittersweet sentiments that course through me. It’s weird how we can hold two—or more—emotions in our bodies at the same time. How do human beings just not explode from too many feelings?

  “A crowbar? You’re not planning on destroying this fountain, are you?”

  “I’ll do everything I can to avoid it.” Alexandre is totally serious as he says this.

  He passes me the screwdriver. My hands are clammy; I can’t get a good grip on the rubber handle. I try to rub the sweat off on my jeans, but in a second my palms are sweaty again. The cycle of nervous anticipation. The screwdriver only succeeds in loosening the screws slightly—it’s not the right size, which I suppose makes sense, seeing that the tool is from the twenty-first century and the screw is probably from the nineteenth. Alexandre steps forward with the pliers and begins gently pulling at one screw until it pops out. Then he gets the other, but the medallion stays in place.

  We try to shift it. And it budges the tiniest bit. My mouth is like cotton, my pulse racing. I want so badly for this to be something.

  Alexandre attempts to grip the medallion from around its edges and nudge it out of place. His faces strains from concentration; he grits his teeth. This time, tiny bits of stone fall from underneath the lion’s head. It’s getting looser. He wedges the screwdriver between the medallion and the stone column. I stand next to him, holding up the medallion by its slim edges so it doesn’t fall forward on us. Alexandre shoves the screwdriver in the hollow we’ve made by shifting the medallion to the left and right. It gives. We both gasp and catch the face of the lion in our hands as it careens forward. We gently place the medallion behind us, then turn back to stare into the dark abyss of a hole in the side of the fountain.

  There’s nothing quippy on the tip of my tongue, but my brain brims—a synaptic tangle of thoughts and feelings and silent screams. My hand trembles as I reach into the darkness.

  The hollow is cool, slightly damp. I stretch up on my tiptoes until my fingers skim the bottom. A shelf, maybe? My hand brushes against something. A jar. It slips from my fingers with a clink. My heart stops. Time stops. “There’s a pot or something in here, but I can’t quite grab it,” I say as I remove my hand.

  Alexandre reaches in. The searching look in his eyes transforms to wonder when he finds the jar. “Got it,” he whispers and carefully pulls the pot out through the hole.

  He cups it in both hands. It’s a simple, milk-colored ceramic pot. A dirty one. I chip at the caked-on mud with my fingernail, and a leaf of dirt falls away, revealing a logo: confitures fines felix potin paris. It’s a jam jar.

  Alexandre stares at the jar. “I knew you’d find it.”

  “We found it. Let’s hope it’s not a-hundred-and-seventy-five-year-old rotten jam.”

  Alexandre puts a grimy hand on mine. I don’t flinch. “Khayyam. Without you . . . I was wrong to deceive you, to let my uncle influence me and push me the way he did. You deserve so much better. I should’ve been honest from the beginning. You deserve the truth.”

  “Maybe that’s what we’re about to find,” I say, my voice catching.

  Leila

  Though I will soon be forgotten, perhaps have been already, I leave this record now to tell my truth:

  I lived.

  I loved.

  I had a voice.

  And in this life, where I had so little to call my own, where my liberty and love were torn from me, I seize this power: the freedom to write my own story.

  Khayyam

  Stories are funny things. Even the mere idea of fiction. Facts exist. But I see now that facts are different than truth. Facts are supposed to be indisputable, unbending (at least until science tells us we were wrong about everything), but even the true stories of who we think ourselves to be are a kind of fiction we create. We build our worlds out of vestiges of history and the fairy tales adults tell us and scraps of poetry we hear: Beauty is truth, truth beauty.

  A poem can be the truth. And a painting. And a novel. And this space right now, between Alexandre and me, in the fading light of early evening in a writer’s haven in the French countryside where words gave life to an epic. And in these words, black ink fading into the weave of cream-colored paper, rests Leila’s truth, revealed at last.

  Alexandre and I stare at the wrinkled and creased sheaf of papers in front of us. The ceramic confiture pot is now back in the kitchen of Château d’If, where it must once have been long ago. Sealed away, it has done its duty, preserved the treasure of Leila’s story, protected her words from rain and predators and opportunists while waiting for us to find them. That’s what I want to believe.

  We find a note folded on top of the story, and I read it out loud, my voice breaking but my heart full.

  Cher Ami,

  I find myself in your debt. For it is you who bade me write my story that I could discover agency in this world, that in placing pen to paper, I may at last rid myself of the specter of a life desperately wanted but unlived. You were not the first who urged me so; Byron encouraged me thus, but I was not yet ready. And finding me indifferent, the poet fashioned his own tale, a dark fantasy, though he had seen the truth with his own eyes. One our dear friend then immortalized on his canvases. Perhaps I should have written sooner, but I was younger, and I feared reliving those unspeakable final days when my beloved was lost to me forever. I did not know then, as I do now, that writing my story was the way for my Giaour to come back to me, a way for me to come back to myself.

  I leave these words with you now, my dear Alexandre, as I bid you adieu. Take care of them. Guard them. They are my heart, exposed.

  In recent years, I felt my inquisitiveness shrivel, as one does, I suppose, when age confronts you. I found that I had replaced Pasha’s gilded cage for one of my own making. But through our talks and debates on our philosophies, indeed, in your sheer joy for even the smallest things, I find my own curiosity for life renewed, and thus I set out on one final adventure. Softer, perhaps, than the grand voyage that brought me here, but a journey I wish to take, and take alone. Do not feel that I have rebuffed you in slipping quietly away. Though as a Muslim, we confess our sins and shortcomings only to God, I offer you this last confession in the hopes that it might ease your mind or your heart. Though you know my heart belongs to another, I have loved you in my own way, Alexandre. Perhaps not with the ardor you sought and conveyed, but in true admiration for your spirit and with a trust I have given no other since I fled my home.

  My departure is bittersweet. Paris is the only home I have known beyond the harem, and yet neither of them was of my choosing.

  I leave now, not as I once was, but something more and stronger. I leave now with my story, at long last my own.

  Peace be with you, my friend, in this life and the next.

  Ever yours,

  I put the letter down as I repeat the words Leila quoted in her story: “The moving finger writes, and having writ moves on.” Words concealed in a jam pot all these years—a century and a half before I was born.

  I shake my head, a lump welling in my throat. It’s not possible.

  “It’s a beautiful line,” Alexandre says.

  “It’s more than words,” I whisper. “It’s Omar Khayyam. That’s the Persian poet she was talking about.”

  “Merde, alors.” Alexandre covers his mouth with his hand. “I know you’ve said a million times you don’t believe in destiny. But Leila’s story was a part of your story all along.”

  I bury my face in my hands. I’m not sure what to believe anymore. I’m not even sure of the difference between fact and fiction. Maybe there is none. Maybe we’re always becoming what we imagine ourselves to be.

  Alexandre shakes his head. �
�What a life. This story—her story. A courtyard of hollowed trees, the yataghan the Giaour gifted her, the sack-death attempt, her rescue by jinns, her protector Si’la. It’s too fantastical to be believed.” He rubs the small of my back.

  “For Muslims, jinns aren’t simply fantastical, mythical creatures,” I say, straightening. “I mean, yes, they entered into legend, but they are God’s creations, beings made from smokeless fire. Shape-shifters. Not singing blue creatures that pop out of magic lamps. Anyway, it doesn’t matter what we believe, does it? It’s Leila’s story—it’s her voice, telling us her truth.”

  “And now the world will know it. Know her,” Alexandre says softly.

  I sigh. I’m still not certain this is the right thing to do. Would Leila have wanted this story to be told? She wrote it for an audience of two. There’s no way she could have imagined the audience that awaits her now. I see the academics and museum curators salivating already. And with Delacroix and Dumas and Byron intertwined in all of this, it’s going to go viral in a massive way. My little ambitions to write a killer essay—to win a contest—seem so small right now.

  Leila, forgive me if this isn’t what you wanted in your time, but maybe your voice and your life have been erased long enough.

  “You’re still not sure, are you?” Alexandre asks.

  “No. But I do think it’s the only thing we can do, that we should do. Leila isn’t voiceless, but she was silenced. And honestly, if she inspired three different geniuses, maybe Leila’s own brilliance and bravery should be uncovered for the world to see and to know. Besides, I’m sick of the old behind every successful man is a great woman BS. Time for this woman’s story to be front and center—in the light of day and not in some man’s shadow.”

  Alexandre nods. “Are you talking about you or Leila?”

  I smile. “Both.”

  The End

  The Beginning

  My parents warned me that it would be a media circus, and they were right. When I finally called them that night after we discovered Leila’s story, they rented a car and drove straight from Brittany to the Château de Monte-Cristo. So many questions and talking and retracing our steps and explaining. And that was just for my parents.

  The next morning, Alexandre contacted his parents and his uncle and the archivist of the estate, and then came preservationists and experts from the Louvre and the Bibliothèque Nationale de France and the Musée Delacroix and the Académie Française. And, wow, was there arguing. Alexandre’s uncle—a skinny, wrinkled man with bushy gray hair who smokes too much—tried to shake my hand. Talk to me. Thank me. I turned my back and walked away. It was all too much. Maybe I’ve found a way to forgive Alexandre, but I haven’t forgotten that his uncle was the puppet master. And I’m tired of people trying to pull my strings.

  That was all before the various steamrolling adults and institutions finally agreed on terms for a press conference where Alexandre and I were presented as these two young sleuths who had performed this incredible service to France, having unearthed a part of her heritage that had been lost. Then they whisked us away without giving us a chance to talk—to tell the whole story, the real one. No surprise there.

  But I had a little surprise in store for them, too. Using my best Sharpie skills and a plain white tee I liberated from Alexandre, I stood on that stage with #writeherstory emblazoned across the front of my shirt, making my loyalties and purpose clear. The press conference isn’t the end of this story; it’s the beginning.

  My parents assured me that I would still get credit for the discovery—my name somewhere on an official piece of paper, on a plaque. That I could—and should—still write an essay about it for the Art Institute, but that now my essay could be published in art history journals, even mainstream media.

  Me, I’m not sure what I want to do next. I only know that I want Leila’s story to be heard and respected. I don’t want her used and forgotten again. I’ll do whatever I can to make sure she isn’t.

  Alexandre saved his family and Dumas’s legacy. Sure, there’s a bureaucratic nightmare of provenance and wills to unravel, but the letters prove that Delacroix painted Leila for Dumas. The family can sell the painting if they want and pay the back taxes on the Château. Of course, there will be a renewed interest in Dumas, and tourists will probably flock to this place. I heard Alexandre’s uncle saying that the family would petition the French government to protect the entire estate as a national historical monument because of our discoveries. That means it would be safeguarded from slimy American real estate tycoons forever.

  I’m happy for Alexandre. I guess in a way, I’ve come to understand his motivations. His desire to help his family. Leila never had that kind of family. She was an orphan whose one true love was murdered before her eyes. Leila might not be related to me by blood, but she’s my family now, and I’ll make sure no one hurts her ever again.

  Today is the goodbye. I’m not sure if I’m ready to face it, but it’s coming whether I’m ready or not.

  My phone rings as I step through the arches of Place des Vosges, past the 1764 Nicola graffiti. It’s Julie.

  She skips the hello. “Are you okay? My parents send me to Internet jail for a month, and I come out to find this angry, weepy email from you and that your #writeherstory photo has gone viral. And there’s some hot dude in a picture with you next to the missing masterpiece you found, and your face looks like you’re going to cry when it should be beaming. What is happening?”

  I laugh. It’s great to hear her voice. “I’ve missed you, too. And, yeah, um, we have a lot to catch up on. A lot.”

  “I know! Give me details. Zaid. This French dude. Delacroix. Leila. Damn, girl, you’ve had a busy summer.”

  “I will. I want to. It’s been amazing. And horrible. But right now, I’m about to meet that hot French dude and say goodbye.”

  “I’m sorry. That sucks. Especially after the BS Zaid pulled, which I am going to give him hell about, by the way.”

  I chuckle. “Nah, it’s okay. Can’t wait to see you.”

  “Text me your flight info. I’ll be waiting for you on your porch.”

  “I know you will,” I say before we hang up.

  I’m usually excited to go home after our annual Paris holiday. And I can’t wait to see Julie and tell her everything. It’s weird, though. Chicago feels so far away right now. Like when I get there, a part of me will still be here in Paris.

  “What do you want to do on your last afternoon here?” Alexandre asks as we sit on a blanket on the grass at Place des Vosges, his fingers busy finalizing the white clover crown he’s been working on the last few minutes. He places it on my head and says, “You are the queen of your fate.”

  “You already used that line on me,” I say, fingering the flowers atop my hair.

  “Time is a flat circle,” Alexandre says. “Time is infinite, but events are finite, so we are destined—or doomed in some cases—to repeat them. Nietzsche called it eternal return.”

  “Uhh, he totally stole that concept from Hinduism and Buddhism.”

  Alexandre grins. “He would probably say that proves his point. There is no new thing under the sun.”

  “Sounds like a sophisticated excuse for plagiarism,” I say. We both laugh. “I guess I see it, though. Time is an endless circle, but it’s a loop, so everything we experience or feel someone else has already experienced and felt before us. But what about the fact that the universe is always expanding? The universe isn’t finite.”

  “Hmm, well, in the universe, space is time, right?”

  I grin, then cover my face with my hands. Alexandre leans over and gently moves them away. Tears splash down my cheeks.

  “Why are you crying?”

  “I don’t know. They’re sort of happy tears, I guess? Time is weird and impossible. Doesn’t it feel to you like we know Leila, like she’s a living, breathing person right now? I
t’s like words made her flesh, but now that the world has her story, she’s receded back into history—a two-dimensional figure in a book to be studied. She was lost and then found, and now she’s slipped away again.”

  Alexandre nods. “For a couple weeks, we were the only ones on earth who knew who she was, even though all we had was an inkling, a small idea of her. I think it’s normal to feel protective of her. We were her guardians for a short time, after all.”

  “I still am. Always.” I give him a soft smile and look off toward Victor Hugo’s house.

  In France, much more so than in America, the past and present live side by side. I guess it’s inevitable then that sometimes those worlds collide. Parallel universes suddenly cognizant of each other’s existence.

  Alexandre touches my elbow. “I got you a little something to say bon voyage.” He hands me a square brown paper package tied in a red satin ribbon. I turn it over to unwrap it and pull out a small wooden frame. Underneath the glass is a sketch of Leila we saw in the archive of the Musée Delacroix. It was a scrap in a file, forgotten, ink on paper, a close-up of Leila’s face in profile looking off in the distance.

  “Oh my God, Alexandre. Did you steal this?”

  A smile spreads across his face. “No one knows that exists besides me and you. And I’m sure Delacroix would want you to have it. And so would Dumas.”

  “And you’re basing this on . . . ?”

  “Delacroix was a family friend and made that sketch for my great-grand-père. As far as I’m concerned, it is a personal heirloom. I’m completely within my rights to give it to you.”

  “I’ll revel in your entitlement since it benefits me. Si tu n’as pas le droit, prend le gauche, non?” If you don’t have the right, take the left.