A Rare Blue Bird Flies with Me

by Youssef Fadel

  I told Faraj I knew all this. I worked out I would need five days of navigation through space to reach the moon. Faraj said mockingly: “What are five days compared to the years you spent tortured, sick, humbled, and jailed?”

  On the other side, the number of people watching doubled. This time I saw my father and my uncle, my father’s brother, among them. Not far from the nurses, the local governor, and the king with his entourage and all his torturers around him. This final view was what sped me up. I hit the air with my hand like I saw Faraj do, the djellaba inflated like a balloon, and I began to rise. They started hurrying and yelling for me to come down.

  “Aziz, come down!”

  “Aziz, where are you going?”

  I was rising up and whenever I went up, I felt my chest constrict. But I know this happens to anyone trying to leave the earth.

  I looked at the earth. The others appeared very small beneath me. They were still yelling. My uncle was accusing and threatening: “Come down, come down, son of a bitch.” But I was going up. My father threatened: “Come down, you son of a bitch.” The local governor threatened, as did the pasha, the mayor, and the king, all of them ordering me to come down. But I was flying in the sky. The sky was close. I had come down once but I wouldn’t come down again. . . . As I rose up, they became small and their yelling and excitement diminished and their chances of grabbing me diminished. Until they disappeared entirely.

  I then began to make out, in bewildering clarity, the gravity of the surface of the lit-up star. . . .

  21

  Benghazi

  8 p.m.

  I’M SPEAKING FROM THE MORGUE. And I didn’t say this is death until I saw it with my eyes in the mirror. You came with the truck, right into the barbershop. The shirt was new and the pants too. When I sold the ring I bought these things and only the barber, who was delighted to see the cash, was left. He said: “Sit on this chair.” The chair’s leather and soft, and only respected customers sit on it. It’s opposite the door, and the breeze reaches it. But it was the truck that came in, instead of the breeze. I saw death in the mirror coming from outside the shop, getting closer. I said: “This truck’s coming. That might be its reflection, but if it keeps going like that, it’ll come all the way inside the barbershop.

  In my mouth there’s foam. I speak now from the storeroom under the ground. Where they put me a while ago. I don’t see what’s around me but I hear every movement. The wall’s complaining because it’s been standing for so long and says it’s decided it will collapse in two days. Its neighbor tightens its upper arm since it has been fighting with the owner of the building. Oh, there’s a line of ants passing near my legs and talking about the nice day they had. A rat says to its neighbor its children haven’t eaten anything today and they’re getting close to me and smelling my neck. The water at the bottom of the storeroom is singing monotonous songs because it’s only good for that. The driver looks over at me and tells the barber he knew the truck brakes would fail one day.

  There’s also glass from the mirror in my head. And a piece of razor. But nothing else that will allow them to identify me. No papers, no contracts, none of the things that allow people to identify each other. And until now, no one recognizes me. If my uncle was here, he’d recognize me. They lift the cover, then look over and put the cover back on my face and move away (and by the way, the stench of the cover is unbearable.) My head’s split open and in it are mirror shards, soap, foam, a piece of the razor, crushed like worn-out flesh.

  After the driver left the morgue, the barber took it on himself to put his hand in my jacket pocket to take out the paper with the horse numbers. Will they recognize my name and address from the horse numbers? The name, address, and profession, all this, at my uncle’s. With the heat of this exceptional year, my body will decompose quickly if someone doesn’t come to identify me. Or my wife doesn’t come to bury me. Or the other one, as they call her, Zina. Is she in the square now, watching the mobs and hearing the songs? And who married who on this happy night? Did our turn come? Did they leave us a place among them to play music to honor us? The square’s hot now and the fires are lit. Every groom takes his new wife to the tent and for all the things that come after that.

  For her, I bought a shirt and pants. For her, I went to the barber. Will she too come and raise the cover to identify me? By waiting for this or that woman to come, I’m left waiting. Even for my corpse to rot. None of those who looked at me recognized me. The barber, the carpenter, and the transient, all of them said: “This man? We haven’t seen him before.” When they left, the barber put his hand in my pocket and took out the cash and I heard it go into his pants pocket. My family has no news about it at all. Seven girls, maybe eight, with their mother and huge debts. I didn’t leave them anything else. Horses, dogs, and girls. The debts and the debtors remain. They don’t die. We earned this at least. The most beautiful thing in this world is to die without repaying your debts. I’ll see their miserable faces when they look over me too. They’ll identify me from the first glance, but after it’s too late. They’ll spit in my face. That’s all they can do. Even though I have a split-open head, and am dead on top of this, I won’t care even if they care about me. The money the barber took. I don’t feel any pain. The pain is outside. I’m relaxed because I won’t pay those wolves a thing. And until now, no one appeared, not even my wife, to take my corpse from this cold place. There are two big rats in the corner consulting with each other but I don’t pay their consultations any mind.

  22

  Aziz

  Later

  MY AUNT KHATIMA DOESN’T WANT to take the medicine. And I, from the door of the room, see my mother bring the spoon to her lips while my aunt refuses it, saying the medicine’s hot. I ask my mother if my aunt’s sick and she shakes her head no. She pushes me to the door. I come back to tell her I want to tell my aunt something. My mother shuts the door this time and my aunt disappears from sight. My mother and I go down to the bar and I ask her if my aunt’s going to die and she scolds me. I go to the man sitting at the table and I tell him my aunt Khatima’s going to die. My mother follows me and I run, disappearing behind the door. I hear my mother talking with the man and then she goes back to the counter. I come out from behind the door and hide under the table so she doesn’t see me. I hear her tell me to come out. I’m under the table and I know she can’t quite see me.

  In the evening, when the men who drink come, there are a lot of feet so my mother doesn’t see me at all. It’s like that with my aunt. But my aunt’s sick. She’ll die because she doesn’t want to take the medicine. I move on my knees to another table and I don’t see my mother anymore. I see the man’s two feet as they move around. As do his fingers. Is his face moving too? I move under another table. The man’s face is turning to the bar. My mother’s always sitting behind the bar, waiting for the sun to come in from the window and settle on her face. My mother likes the sun as it comes down on her face. She’s looking at the man sitting at the table. From under the table, I see his feet. His shoes are old. I go over to his shoes and touch them. He moves his feet and my mother yells: “Leave the man alone.”

  I look at him and laugh. The man laughs with his old face. His face is like his shoes. I tug on his pants and tell him about my aunt Khatima. My mother scolds me but I tug on his pants again and run away. I wait for him to follow me. He doesn’t. I hide behind the door, waiting for my mother to follow me. My mother asks me not to bother the man. My aunt, instead of the medicine, loves to drink sparkling mineral water because it relieves her pains. My mother is looking closely at the man. I tell her I want to tell him something. I wait to see what my mother will do.

  She leaves the counter and goes over to him. She asks him if he wants a drink. I come out from under the table and tell the man I want a soda. She hits me on the shoulder and says, “Shame on you.”

  I laugh and run from her because she wants to grab me. The man says he doesn’t want anything right now. Maybe later. My mother loo
ks at him for a long time. She tells him his face is familiar. He tells her face is familiar. I laugh at their words. My mother takes a step back, rubs her nose, bites her lip, and gets close to him. She then goes behind the counter and looks for the satchel and comes back with a piece of old paper and puts it in front of him on the table. Part of a pack of cigarettes, like what I see on the tables of the men who come to the bar. The man looks at the paper breathlessly. Then he laughs. When she sits on the chair next to him, he says he has spent the past few years wandering. He moved between cafés and faces and forests and cities and bridges and alleys and villages. Hospitals and islands and skies. Especially hospitals. He remembered Stork Bar without remembering the address but the storks finally showed him the way. My mother says, “Storks come back to the nests they know.”

  The man says: “Yes, they know their nests. Before leaving, they put their scent on their nest so they recognize it when they come back.”

  “Did you follow them?”

  “Yes, and I’ve arrived.”

  Their words are funny from start to finish. Storks are beautiful but their beaks are huge. When one of them hits its beak with the other, it becomes annoying. I leave them and stand at the door. There’s less light than before, because the sun has started disappearing behind the mountain. I see the street is empty. Then it is full of people. My mother asks me what’s happening. I tell her people are running around in the street. She comes and stands next to me. People in the street are running, not looking at us as we are looking at them. I go back inside without hiding under the table. I go to the counter and open the fridge and take out a bottle of soda. My mother doesn’t scold me because she’s standing at the door. I close the fridge. I come out from behind the counter and take a long sip. The man asks me: “Why are they running?”

  I take another sip and shrug. My mother comes back in and stands next to me. I ask her: “Why are they running, Mama?”

  “The king is dead.”

  “Like Aunt Khatima?”

  “You aunt isn’t going to die.”

  “Who’s the king?”

  ‘When you get bigger, you’ll know who he is.”

  “I’m big.”

  The man turns to me and tells Mama: “It’s true, she’s big.”

  He touches my cheeks and I hit his hand. Mama says: “Shame on you.”

  I disappear under the table. I start looking at the men running in the street. My mother goes and lowers the blinds and locks the iron door on both sides so I don’t see the men anymore. The noise and yelling and running continues in the street. This time, I see from under the table four feet instead of two. I see that the man’s feet have calmed down. I hear him ask her about my aunt Khatima and she replies: “It’s the usual pain.” I expect them to keep talking until I know why they’re sitting next to each other. This time, I hear him tell Mama: “I owe you something.” He isn’t looking at her either.

  My mother says: “What do you owe me?”

  She takes my hands and brings me out from under the table and returns to her seat next to the man. He is looking at her but she, instead of looking at him, is playing with my hair. She puts me in her lap and keeps playing with my hair.

  The man turns to me and asks her: “Who’s this?”

  My mother says, playing with my hair: “She’s our girl.”

  “What’s her name?”

  “Aziz.”

  The man leans over me, wanting to kiss my cheek. His face doesn’t look like mine. It doesn’t look like my mother’s. I wipe my cheek. She puts me on the ground. She keeps looking at the ground. And playing with her fingers. The man is looking at the ground too.

  “How old is she?”

  “Eight years old.”

  I say they know each other and I wonder why they’re not talking.

  “I owe you something.” He is looking at her this time.

  My mother says: “You don’t remember what you owe me?”

  She laughs loudly and puts her hand over her mouth.

  Again he says: “I owe you something.”

  My mother’s the one who bends her head this time. She tells me go play over there.

  I tell her I’m going to see my aunt.

  She says: “No.”

  I say I want to tell her something.

  I go back under the table so my mother doesn’t see me anymore. My aunt Khatima doesn’t see me anymore. I hear the man say: “I owe you something.” I look over at her. Her face grows red. I disappear again. I don’t hear what they’re saying anymore. I don’t see their faces anymore. I see the man’s hand moving and touching my mother’s hand. I cast a glance at them between the table legs. The man’s face is leaning over hers. His mouth is on hers and I think: This man knows my mother. He owes her a kiss. I laugh because he came from far away to get his kiss. I laugh because she gave him his kiss. I laugh because I am happy.

  SELECTED HOOPOE TITLES

  The Televangelist

  by Ibrahim Essa, translated by Jonathan Wright

  Whitefly

  by Abdelilah Hamdouch i, translated by Jonathan Smolin

  Time of White Horses

  by Ibrahim Nasrallah, translated by Nancy Roberts

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