When he comes back in the evening, he says: “We worked hard today. Tomorrow we’ll work more.”
We ask him if the road has reached the capital and he says: “Little by little.”
I love my uncle a lot but I don’t love my father and I don’t love my mother.
From the branches of the fig tree, I look at the waterwheel. The waterwheel stays in its place. Like the fig hedge. And the olive trees. I look for the stone we put on top of the bird. I can’t make out the stone because it’s far away. Maybe the bird got up from its nap, moved the stone off, and flew away without me seeing it. I hear a bird tweeting among the fig leaves. It might be our bird, which we buried near the waterwheel. Far from the waterwheel, on the horizon, a specter crosses. I enjoy watching its quick progress. After a bit, the specter becomes a man moving on his mule. My mother cries under the tree. The neighbor women console her and my uncle chides her. My mother cries and says she longs for her son and I’m surprised by her words. She says she prefers to stay with her children and my uncle says he always has enough to provide for us. The man who was advancing on his mule is moving now next to the waterwheel. He finally stops at the hills of the olive trees, dismounts, and sits on a stone, wiping off his sweat. As if his journey ended right here. In front of our house. My uncle doesn’t look for me anymore because he’s busy with my mother’s crying. Does Khadija know why the man has come? To sit among the olive trees looking at the house? Did he come to take our mother with him? Until now, she has only been using gestures. My mother is crying even before she joins him, begging him to take her far away on his mule. His scent wafts from her. The neighbor women say: “It’s better we go back to our father so he takes care of us until we’ve grown up.”
The man stares at the house like someone waiting for a woman to come out to take her away with him. Not like someone waiting for kids. Because we’ll run away to the woods and live with monkeys, not our father and his wife who doesn’t like us. Maybe the ram liked us as we liked it. Is the ram still in the barracks? Does the ram still occupy our mother’s thoughts even after her husband left with this woman? The ram doesn’t know if my mother is thinking about it or not. It doesn’t know and it doesn’t care. It doesn’t know if we go from house to house. For my part, I don’t understand why a ram had to be at the front of the brass band, or how it knows what route to take. White, fat, and washed, it knows the way.
A woman comes and put a container of broth and a lot of bread in front of the man and goes back inside. She doesn’t say hello to him and he doesn’t say hello to her. He washes his hands in the water coming off the waterwheel. Instead of a djellaba, he wears a blue smock. He rubs his hands and his beard on it and begins to pray. His mule is rubbing its body on the bark of the tree and looking at him as he prays. When he leans over the container, his face disappears. My uncle comes and sits next to him. My mother pulls Khadija by her arm and kisses her as she cries. The two men get up and go toward the house. They stand in the courtyard under the tree. The man lifts his eyes to the tree and gestures that I should come down. I come down. My uncle says: “You’re going to live with your other uncle, your father’s brother.”
12
Baba Ali
2:30 a.m.
THE OWL SCREECHED AS IT does whenever one of the prisoners dies. I asked Benghazi: “Why don’t we bury him like Muslims are buried?”
He went back to playing checkers. With two colors. As if he was leaving some time between us so he could understand what I said.
“At least we should bury them like Muslims.”
“How do you bury Muslims?”
“With a shroud.”
“Why does he need a shroud?”
“At least he’ll die at peace and won’t come back to us at night.”
Was Benghazi making fun of me, asking if the dead come out at night? We went back to playing but I couldn’t summon the same enthusiasm. This time, we heard the sound clearly. Distinctly. At night. From the middle of the courtyard. My heart shook and the hair stood up on my head.
“You hear it?”
“Yes.”
Benghazi heard the owl this time and he couldn’t pretend he didn’t. But it didn’t stir anything in him. Not a single hair of his shook, even though it was the last death. We kept wondering, whenever the owl screeched, when there were a lot of them. Whose turn is it this time? There was no more contempt in my heart since I started seeing them at night. My mind kept seeing Aziz dead. After burying him, would I be able to relax? Even if not a single push from the prisoners came, would I be able to relax? We’d been burying them for twenty years. One group after another, and I always said: “They’re the last group.” Always lying to myself. My mind kept following the screeching of the owl too. Its echo following in the heart of the night. It was like a string of lights that lit up and went out at night. It lit up and went out in the heart of empty desert nights, causing a strange stinging inside me. For the first time.
Benghazi got rid of the checkers in his hand, cursing, using words I didn’t understand. I didn’t understand what Benghazi was saying, even when he wasn’t cursing. He got up as if he remembered something. He took the lamp and went out. Benghazi said he wasn’t afraid of the dead. He wasn’t afraid of anyone. Not of humans and not of the jinn. He was only afraid of his uncle, the commander. He’s not his uncle but he calls him uncle to flatter him. I don’t like him, whether he’s his uncle or not. I don’t like Benghazi. I got up and went after him. His big body was tottering in front of me like a bear in the night. From behind him, I said: “Let’s bury them like Muslims. Let’s at least bury them like Muslims.”
He didn’t respond. We stopped in front of the cell. In front of its small door. He said: “Go in.”
I said: “I’m not going in.”
He kept looking at the door and rubbing his chin. His head is big, like the head of an elephant. As he was thinking he grabbed his head as if he was afraid of falling from the weight of his thoughts. He held the lamp out to me and snuck inside the cell. I directed the lamp at Benghazi and saw him bend over the dead man and look through his pockets. He came out, took the lamp from me, and went back inside. My eyes kept seeing him searching the dead man. What was Benghazi’s hand doing in the dead man’s rags? I saw the other hand put out the lamp. As if the colluding hands fell on something they didn’t want me to see.
I insisted on asking: “What’s your hand doing in the dead man’s pocket, Benghazi?”
The lamp came back on again. This time, Benghazi was holding Aziz’s thigh and lifting it up high. The dead man didn’t move. Benghazi was turning toward me as if to convince me he wasn’t interested in the pocket but in the dead man. I kept asking him what he had taken from one of his pockets.
The sergeant said: “It’s over, he’s dead.” He turned the lamp on the dead man’s face.
At that moment, I forgot what was in Aziz’s pocket. Aziz looked like he had been extinguished. His usual hopeful expression had disappeared. No flash of teeth, no tormented look. Nothing. His face was smooth. Expressionless. A thick liquid clung to the thick hair on his face and his torn clothes. As if he had fought death for a long time. We wrapped the blanket around him, forgetting his pocket or what was in it, or if he even had a pocket to begin with. His wrap was worn, torn, and black. We pulled him toward the courtyard. Toward the hole. Benghazi said, laughing: “You like this torn shroud?” I don’t joke about things like that. I don’t make fun of the dead. The shroud should be clean and white, always.
He was trying to explain to me that we’ve always buried them without a shroud or a wrap. But my mind was telling me: Aren’t we used to tossing them without a wrap, and naked too?
Without trying to understand him, I repeated: “We have to bury him like a Muslim. With a white shroud at least, as a Muslim . . . with the shroud and verses from the Quran.”
“The shroud, white . . . if you have one.”
“I don’t.”
Then I didn’t hear him anymore. I sai
d: “Let’s wait until morning. We’ll buy him a shroud. We’ll bury him like a Muslim. In a new white shroud with the scent of cloth, not the scent of shit.”
That’s what I said. If we bury him in a shroud, it will be like we were burying the others in a shroud too. Because God will see our final act and forgive us for our previous sins. He’ll see we were forced and we did what we were told to do. We’ll have done a good deed on our own because the dead man’s dead and it doesn’t matter to him if he’s buried in a shroud or not. Do you understand, Benghazi? The dead don’t know. We do this for us, not for someone who doesn’t care anymore about sleeping naked or covered. Do you understand that at least? As if we forgot the dead are buried in shrouds and we finally remembered. Do you know? God will see all the effort we make. If it came late, it’ll show our best intentions and He’ll forgive us for what happened before. He’ll think about the matter from every angle and He’ll see in the end there’s no escape from forgiveness. Especially with some verses from the Quran. . . .
The pits are there. Always ready. With a barrel of lime next to them. When we were about to toss Aziz, the dog appeared. She came out from behind the palm tree. The sergeant put the lamp on the ground and a spot of light glowed. Night spread around us—me, Hinda, and Aziz on his back in his disgusting wrap. He won’t be buried like a Muslim. In a white shroud and with verses from the Quran. The darkness was doubled outside the spot of light covering us. Benghazi disappeared behind the palm tree to get the shovel. Benghazi doesn’t need light. He moves in the night like the owl that was screeching or like bats. Or like any vermin. I turned toward the lamp and saw the dead man’s face. His eyes were open. As if he was looking at me. His lips moved. As if he wanted to say something. Even Hinda came up to him and began sniffing him. I thought I heard a call. Aziz was calling me. The dog jumped back, letting out a strange sound, and terror took hold of me like a current of electricity hitting me. The dog sounded as if he were wailing. I went back to staring at the dead man. His lips were moving. Aziz was still alive. No doubt about it. When the sergeant came back with the shovel, I told him: “Aziz is still alive.”
“He’s dead, I’m telling you.”
I took the lamp and shined it on his face: “Look.” His eyes were closed this time. His mouth was frozen. No movement at all. As if he’d died a second time.
“What am I going to see? There’s nothing for me to see.”
I lit up his face again. It was frozen. My mind is imagining things tonight. The night of the dead. My mind isn’t there anymore. It’s been shaken. I told Benghazi: “We’ll hurry to bury him before disaster strikes us.” As if he was only waiting for direction. I tossed the wrap over Aziz’s face and we pushed him into the hole and threw a big pile of lime on top of him. We piled the dirt on him.
For a while, I kept looking at the shovel on the pile of dirt, unable to move. As if my limbs were paralyzed. What am I doing here? Benghazi said: “We don’t need to talk to ourselves because we came together to the casbah to double our salary and other things.”
Did I forget? With a bad beginning, you quickly forget how you started, not knowing how you’ll end. You begin as a cook or a guide like Benghazi and all of a sudden you become a gravedigger, and then you bury the dead and you end up burying even the living. Benghazi put out the lamp. We went back to the room.
“Play.”
But I don’t play because I don’t see the board anymore. I see Aziz fighting to get out of the hole. His mouth is full of soil and lime as he fights. I think: The least that can happen is for Aziz to come in to us covered in dirt and lime. Naked except for a white wrap instead of a shroud, and a covering of the lime we tossed on him. My head was on fire, hot like an oven. My limbs became weak after the previous convulsions. Sweat was pouring from my forehead and I felt it moving freely, flowing down my chest like a secret stream. Sweat didn’t flow from Benghazi’s forehead. As if burying the living was his job. Benghazi said if I think about it, he was going to die anyway. If not now, then in an hour. If not in an hour, then tomorrow as that’s how the world works. What’s the use of this dead man adding another hour or two to his life?
“Play, Baba Ali. The man’s dead and that’s it.”
He lit the hash pipe and handed it to me. “Want to smoke?”
I took the hash pipe, and after two puffs, my anxiety went up instead of going down.
“What’s wrong with you, Baba Ali? Forget the dead man, Baba Ali. Forget him like I forgot him.”
But when I tried to forget him, I thought about him more. Maybe because of the hash, I saw him coming through the door and shaking the lime off his shoulders. I played so I didn’t see the door. I forgot Aziz. I forgot the white dust tossed on us. He was the last prisoner. My mind will relax after him. My mind won’t relax after him. This idea alone was enough. I searched inside me for calm but didn’t find it. I told Benghazi: “We won’t bury anyone after today.” I believe I smiled but I’m not sure. The sergeant laughed, repeating: “We won’t bury anyone after today.”
“Play, Baba Ali.”
I tossed the checker. I looked at my hand. It was shaking.
Hinda started barking outside.
I didn’t know if my eyes were open or closed. My body told me they were closed. My mind said the opposite. I saw Benghazi like a line of smoke, letting out sounds like the owl that was screeching a little while ago. Then there were other sounds outside. Some steps outside, rattling, creaking, rustling, making my body leave me. It was Aziz breathing. Do you hear him breathing behind the door? His eyes were enveloping the room so I couldn’t leave. They were looking out from the window and the door. Is there time to get out, and where should I leave from? There’s a roof, walls, light on, light off, lime, dust, specters, running, and screaming. . . .
13
Hinda
2:30 a.m.
1
I STILL WONDER AFTER ALL these years if I was forced to follow him to this wasteland. I’m now in a faraway place. Far from any city. A casbah erected in the middle of dry land. No farming, and no water at all except for some palm trees growing in the courtyard. Its clay walls are high. The soldiers who bring us water put the full metal cistern at the door, take the empty one, and leave. Important officers come from the capital but they don’t leave the commander’s office. Except for me and the two guards, Baba Ali and Benghazi, no one comes in or goes. The commander stays in his office. On Saturday, he goes to Meknès to visit his family, and he comes back Monday at dawn. I haven’t gone with him for a while. Not to his house and not to the bar where we met for the first time. Sometimes he doesn’t go anywhere. He gets drunk in his office with one of the girls from the nearby villages. Baba Ali and Benghazi are in the casbah all the time. They go home twice every three days. They live in a nearby village, not far from the casbah. They spend all their time in their room playing checkers. I don’t like Benghazi. I especially don’t like it when he puts his hand on my back. Baba Ali isn’t like Benghazi. About once a month he comes in to see us in the commander’s office. He asks him: “What do you want, Baba Ali?” Baba Ali hands him a piece of paper, saying he only wants the government to send him on the hajj so he can cleanse his sins before it’s too late.
I don’t regret it. I don’t expect a lot from people. I only wonder what the commander was thinking and what he needed with me as he was opening his car door for me. Maybe he thought I was a hunting dog. It wouldn’t be his first mistake, in any case. Here’s an important man, everyone respects him here in the casbah and outside it, doing what he wants like a king in his kingdom, but he didn’t catch a single bird during the seven years I was with him. How many times did I laugh to myself, watching him doing his stupid sport? As soon as he’s ready and he lifts the rifle, the birds fly off. I laugh more when I hear the other birds in the nearby trees chuckling. For the first time, I see human stupidity. About a year ago, the commander hung up his rifle on the wall.
The courtyard is full of the dead. Lots of people come here to
die. In the courtyard, I watch the dead moving under the ground. There were more than 370 when I came here seven years ago. When death comes for one of them, they drag him by his foot to the edge of the hole, toss him in, and pour lime on top of him for him to burn. This is a way to bury the dead I hadn’t seen before. Twice I saw them bring out a dead person from one of the rooms, pushing him in a wheelbarrow. (Just as they used to do with us when they were taking us behind the town slaughterhouses to put us to death. A small, gray, overfull cart just for our execution.) The wrap came off and dragged on the ground while the dead man kept swaying back and forth on top of the wheelbarrow, naked. A pile of bones, covered by hair. Alive or dead, a dog stays a dog. But this dead man was turned into something else I didn’t recognize at all. Not human and not animal. A lump of festering hair, emitting a disgusting smell, more putrid than the stench of the corpse. What was left of his rags was hard like wood. The stench of piss and human feces and pus and decay all piled up, the stench of something disgusting. I hadn’t seen anything like this before. I retreated. As for Baba Ali and Benghazi, they moved to the hole like they were carrying a sack of potatoes.
One night, they were so busy playing they put off burying a body. When they came back the next day, they found the rats had eaten his entire stomach.
2
When they’re not burying people, they’re playing checkers. They’re in their room now, absorbed in playing. I see the dull light of the room on the other side of the courtyard. My mind is troubled tonight. I feel something unusual is happening. Alone, I’m thinking about the darkness. Actually, I’m thinking about the man buried alive. I’m thinking about the still-fresh dirt on top of him. The rats begin looking out from their lairs when they smell the banquet and think in their little brains they’ll dine on fresh meat as they did before on the stomach of his friend. The rats are called to an exceptional feast tonight. Anger never overwhelmed me like it did at that moment. I lived with humans. I spent my entire life with them. I know them, or I thought I did. Humans don’t bury people alive. Tears of horror well up in my eyes. There isn’t a living thing that buries another living thing alive. Not bugs or animals or inanimate beings. I am boiling inside. Dogs aren’t humans but they have feelings, even if they’re simple. They know what pain and misery are. And joy and happiness. I start barking to scare the rats. And they actually disappear for a while. Or they retreat so as to attack again. When I start digging, I hear them digging on the other side of the grave. As if we have the same goal.
A Rare Blue Bird Flies with Me Page 13