The Garden of Last Days

by Andre Dubus III

  Oh, these kufar! Look at them. In front of a shop, two men play a guitar and drum. One’s hair is long and dirty. The other has no hair, and they play loudly and fast and the guitar player sings with a voice that only shouts, and look at the kafir woman dance to it in the sunlight. Her nose is pierced with silver, as are her ears and the skin above her eyes. Her hair is red and black and blue. Her ugliness is only surpassed by her lack of modesty, her nuhood beneath her T-shirt bouncing and jerking with her movement.

  He hurries past them and the happy kufar watching. There is the guitar case of money, of loose change lying in blue fabric. All the money he let the whore April take. She must think him a fool or crazy from drinking. Or both. These people are only happy if you burn with them, and he cannot stop seeing the thrusting. Each woman he passes, he sees her on her hands and knees, the man’s hands grasping her, the thrusting into her, a depth he did not know they had.

  He is nearly hard again and he passes the newsstand. Gray stacks of newspapers, magazines in wooden racks and behind glass and inside the shadows of the shop. Is it possible that even one does not have upon its cover an immodest and beautiful woman?

  How weak he was to lie there and do nothing as Tariq pressed the buttons. How weak.

  There is more music, more dirty musicians in more doorways. Like the various radios playing on the bright beaches of Florida as he and his brothers rode their mopeds, the conflicting sounds then. Always such noise here. Three doorways. Three sorts of music. The young men and now an old one, his beard white, his hair tied backward like a woman, he plays an electric guitar, the sharp notes like needles puncturing the skin. And near the main square and the passing autos, in front of the bookstore and its stone columns and glass doors, a Japanese or Chinese kafir is playing the stringed instrument she holds at her shoulder beneath her chin, her music more beautiful than the others’, but her hair is long and straight and black and he sees her penetrated, only now it is his hands grasping her, his thrusting.

  Do you see the work of Shaytan? Can you feel his power? He is working hard now, is he not? Is he not working hard to confuse him, to weaken him and Tariq? Shaytan has not been able to influence Imad or the Egyptian or, please Allah, any of the others. But he is working hard now to corrupt two of the four who will travel first.

  There are the autos and vans passing before him, the smell of exhaust pleasing to him, a scent from home, though the conflicting music behind him is too much, the stringed instrument of the girl, the electric piercings of the old kafir, the drumming farther away, the voices of all the young and old kufar passing him on the sidewalk. Again the horns blaring at him, and Bassam does not remember running into the traffic with his notebook away from the musics and the girl from the east he can see now uncovered.

  There is yet another newsstand, this one larger. Many hundreds of magazines. So many. The shelves are the color of bare flesh. He wants to go inside. But it is Shaytan pulling him. And Bassam runs past the newsstand away from the square and its crowds and shops and warring musics, the Au Bon Pain where earlier he attempted to write to his mother but could not. There were too many young women. The air warm—not like Florida, not like home—but warm so they wore little, these waking, laughing jinn from the fires of Jahannam.

  He would write the letter back in the hotel, Tariq exercising with Imad. But Imad was resting and Tariq lay there watching the life of this world as filmed by the kufar, then he pressed Movies. Then Shaytan pressed the rest.

  Tariq, you must be strong, brother. You must help me find the river south. You have to be clear, brother. You have to be pure.

  This time no horns. He is across the street upon the sidewalk. The sun shines on the red stone of the high wall of the best school. It shines in the hair of the mushrikoon girls and boys, and Bassam walks among them and through the arched gate into the shaded grounds of this Harvard. There are no guards to stop him. No policemen. Only the young students and the deep green grass beneath the trees. The paved walkways wide and clean. Already there is more quiet. The drums an echoing in the traffic behind him.

  O Lord, I ask You for the best of this place and ask You to protect me from its evils.

  He is walking beside a girl and boy holding hands. Her hair is long and blond and she is tall and her back is straight. They speak about someone, a friend, a Jules, lawskule. Bassam cannot place the word. She sees him. She smiles and turns back to her friend, continues her talk of Jules. But her smile is so warm and open and not paid for. Kelly, the trainer, her smile like that. Her bare neck, her hair pinned above it. And April, for just those moments in the end, when he spoke of Khalid, her face a face with no lies masking it. And because this blond girl’s smile was warm, Bassam falls behind and follows them.

  Along the high walls beyond the trees rise stone buildings, some of their sides covered with vines and green leaves. And now they are climbing many steps. They are long and each could hold twenty or thirty people. Some students sit on them and smoke or speak on cell phones or read books or write in notebooks such as the one he holds. He could be one of them. In appearance he could be one of these kufar. He is better dressed than many of them, his khaki pants ironed by himself this morning, his polo shirt clean from the hotel’s laundry service, and before dressing he made the supplication for it. He looks over the students on the steps and enters through the glass doors, and he sees many faces from other parts of the world—Japan, Italy, perhaps Algeria and Bahrain, Cambodia or Vietnam. And of course all the healthy white faces like those of the two he follows into the largest of buildings.

  A security officer sits upon a stool beside a desk. He laughs and nods his head with a woman there, the woman’s eyes passing over Bassam for only a moment. The floor is polished stone and gives way to a deep carpet. Everywhere there are students sitting in chairs or at long tables, their books and papers open before them, yet this endless room is quiet. There are only the sounds of turning pages, a cough, whispers. Bassam sits. At this shining wooden table are many chairs but those near him are empty. At the end a black kafir woman writes. She is very dark, the color of a Sudanese. Her eyes move to his and he sees she does not see him but what is in her head to write and he looks downward, again the black whore sitting beside April, the brightly colored flesh she parted for him, just the beginning of a great depth he knows now. He forces the picture from his thoughts. He opens his notebook.

  High shelves across from him rise meters in the air. They are filled with books. He can smell them, their dusty pages. Their thick covers. He has never been in a place such as this, but there is the feeling he has—many times. All the people, quiet, working together but separately on similar tasks, the rising ceiling, the carpet beneath him—a mosque.

  Bassam feels at the farthest edge of falling into a new knowledge, but who are these people to give a building of books the same respect as the holy place for the Holy One? Look at how they are stored with such precision and such respect when there is only one Book to be read.

  These stupid people. Look at them, their faces lowered to these pages, studying only the life of this world, preparing to rise within it, to rise in their unbelief to power they will use against his brothers and sisters. So often he has asked himself why do these kufar have so much power? Why have they been given all that they have?

  But look, Bassam, at what they have. They have eyes yet they do not see. They have ears yet they do not hear. And from their mouths come only seductions and boasts and lies. And do not forget Yunis 10:88, “‘Lord,’ said Moses, ‘You have bestowed on Pharaoh and his nobles splendor and riches in this life, so that they may stray from Your path.’”

  Bassam’s heart pounds inside him but his legs no longer feel too light and his hands are steady. The woman at the desk, how she glanced upon you as if you were a student at this best school; to be included in this, something that would make Ahmed al-Jizani proud. Because why do you prepare to write to your honored mother and not your father? His tired eyes lecturing you of jihad. His newly
purchased thawb loose upon him. The clothing he buys with his dirty money working for the kufar. And their jahili king selling himself and their kingdom as well, allowing their holy lands to be occupied, blocking the route of the Prophet, peace be upon him, to the farthest mosque in Jerusalem.

  Khalid was educated and he was Bassam’s older brother, but he was weak, too. Perhaps even weaker than himself. If the kufar had not been allowed to spread its dirty music across the borders, its cigarettes and autos and televisions, its noise and its speed and its distractions. If the king had not allowed it into the birthplace of the Prophet, Allah’s blessings and salutations be upon him, would not Khalid still be alive in Khamis Mushayt? Would not their mother have been spared her grief? For accept this, too, Bassam, there is no guarantee Khalid was spared either. Yes, he would give a cold man his coat, but his mind was given over to these people, was lost to these people.

  The kufar couple are sitting at a small table. They face one another. The woman’s foot rests on the man’s bare knee, and he reads as if he is not this close to a woman, as if this means nothing. He is large. He is an athlete of some kind, and Bassam has practiced often against men his size, many times with Imad. The hand on the forehead, the jerking backward, the thrusting into the skin below the ear. He could do it now. He could walk into their area, stand a meter behind the man, pretend he is looking at the high window and its afternoon light, the ‘Asr prayer coming soon, very soon. She may look up at Bassam and smile again, so warmly as before, and he would strike, the blade pulled from the boy’s neck before he even feels the hand upon his forehead. The blood that must come. Her screams. Her eyes the eyes of one who can now see. Her ears that can now hear.

  Bassam’s heart is pushing hard in his chest. He opens the notebook, puts the pen from Florida to the right side of the page.

  O Dear Mother, ya umma al’aziza, I said to you I would write but I have not written. For this I am apologizing. Muta’assif.

  Mother, what I have done, Insha’Allah, I have done for the Creator. This is a great honor. I hope you are well pleased.

  Bassam stops writing. His father, he sees him laughing so immodestly. Sitting against the tapestried wall of the outer building with his brothers, with Uncle Rashad, laughing at one of his jokes. Bassam as a boy, he walked into the room, his father and uncle still laughing, Ahmed al-Jizani’s eyes wet and shining as they saw him, the joy there, an added happiness that he was here, his youngest son of so many. And the years that followed. His only son not to go to university. Those days with no end in rooms of lessons he soon forgot and the sitting and sitting he could not forget—why go to university when the streets and teahouses and souqs and malls are full of educated men with no jobs? Why go to university only to race on the highway and smoke on Mount Souda with educated men who, if they have work at all, it is for those such as Ali al-Fahd? Why, Father? And what will you think of me soon, Father? Will you be proud? Will you be ashamed? Ashamed you could not see what was in your own home. A chosen one? A chosen shahid? Or will you disown me, Father? Are you so blind and deaf, you no longer truly believe?

  The black kafir woman coughs. It is time for prayer, time to leave this temple of false idols and pray with his brothers. And if Tariq has not turned off the haram movie, Bassam will do it for him. He will pick up the television and throw it into the street. He knows he is strong enough to do this. He can feel it with each breath, with each breath given to him by the Mighty.

  He reads what he has written. He does not know how to sign it. What final word for her when there is not even one for his father?

  Far away there is muffled laughter. He must hurry back and pray. He writes:

  YOUR SON,

  MANSOOR BASSAM AL-JIZANI

  IN A WAL-MART south of Bradenton, April pushed a cart up and down the aisles and filled it with things for Franny: a deep green bedspread, three pair of shorts, two cotton dresses, one she’d love because it had smiling yellow suns against blue; she picked out two bathing suits, a pair of flip-flops, a packet of underwear, and four pairs of ankle socks with purple stitching at the hem. She bought her a sand bucket and shovel and a pair of goggles. She wanted to get her a new toy chest for her room. And maybe a soft chair for kids. But they couldn’t look new. None of this should be in her room looking too new.

  She was hungry. It was after one and it occurred to her she’d had nothing all day but coffee. She pushed her cart into the fast-food area near the big tinted windows and ordered a hot dog and Diet Coke and she sat in an orange booth and ate too quickly. She regretted telling Lonnie she’d let him take her to dinner. Leaving the club, she knew she wanted to go shopping for Franny, then work on her room until it looked better than it ever had. But Lonnie was so cheerful and upbeat after quitting the Puma, he wanted to take her out to lunch on a beach somewhere.

  “I need to get ready for tomorrow, Lonnie. Can you just drive me back home first?”

  He’d looked guilty for thinking of himself, but she felt as if she’d just used him and owed him something.

  “Maybe later?” she’d said.

  “Dinner?”

  “Okay.”

  She had the rest of the afternoon ahead of her, but first she had to find a furniture store. There was that big mall in Bradenton. Franny liked it because of the Play Place in the food court, the netted pit of hundreds of plastic balls, Franny sliding down the red chute into them, disappearing as if she were underwater.

  At a table on the other side of her cart, a man kept looking at her over his sandwich. He sat across from his wife and daughter, both heavy, the woman’s bra strap creasing the flesh under her shirt. His face was pink and shaved smooth, and he looked away from her looking back at him. April may have danced for him but couldn’t remember. She stood and crossed the room to throw away her hot dog wrapper and half-empty cup. She knew he was watching her, his face on fire that his nightworld and dayworld were here in the same place at the same time. It was as if she were electrified, could walk over there, put her hand on his shoulder, and make his heart stop. It was a power she did not want. A fame she’d like to shed.

  Out in the bright parking lot, she pushed her cart over the asphalt past all the glaring cars. She hoped she’d be able to get the furniture in her trunk, that whatever she bought would be small enough to fit into the only space she had.

  TARIQ’S SHOES ARE no longer near the entrance. The room is darkened and quiet, the television off, and Bassam can hear them through the wall. Their voices are low. They are preparing for prayer. He places his notebook upon his bed and leaves quickly, allowing the door to close and lock behind him. He will perform his ablutions in Imad’s room, and he knocks upon the door. “Imad? Tariq?”

  Imad greets him. His face is damp. He smiles downward at him and steps to the side, and as Bassam removes his shoes, he hears the voice of the Egyptian, he hears Amir.

  “Mansoor?”

  It has only been ten days but the Egyptian has changed; his face is shaved as usual and there are the dark lines he applies beneath his eyes, but he appears thinner, his skin olive-yellow, his eyes darker, and he smiles at him and approaches and grasps his hand and kisses both his cheeks. “Assalaamu ‘alaykum.”

  “Wa ‘alaykum assalaam.”

  Amir keeps his hand on Bassam’s shoulder, regards Tariq standing near the bed, Imad. “Everyone is here now. And the rest are where they should be. Have you been fasting?” He asks this in a way Bassam has never heard before, not as a commander, forever monitoring him, doubting him, but as gently as would a friend.

  “Yes,” says Imad. And so Bassam does not have to say no, he has not been fasting.

  “Good.” Amir steps to the bed and opens a leather briefcase. It has brass fasteners and they snap open on the springs and he lifts the case’s cover and removes three sealed envelopes. Bassam thinks how he must mail his letter to his mother. He must mail it.

  “Brothers,” Amir hands one to each of them. There is no writing on its face, nor on its back. “Tomorrow
, Insha’Allah, is the last day, and you will open these. Read these instructions carefully and follow them.” He looks to each of them. The light of the lamp is in his eyes, and Bassam can smell his cologne, the same as before and now even stronger, but this is not the Egyptian with whom he has lived and traveled these months. Forever watching over each detail of each movement, of each plan, of each place they have lived. Forever watching them. This is the Egyptian Bassam saw for only one moment when he pulled the Cessna’s stick and they rose so steeply into the sky, Allah is great, Allah is great, his face so expectant of the joy to come, his reward everlasting.

  “We are just moments away, brothers, Allah willing. But you must be vigilant and you must help one another and be strong. After tomorrow’s morning prayer, read these and follow them. I will see you the next morning in the matar, Insha’Allah. Now hurry, finish your ablutions and we will pray together. Then I must leave.”

  They have pushed the second bed aside and there is room for two rows of two, Tariq and the Egyptian Amir, then Imad and Bassam. Imad has lighted the incense, and how fitting that the direction in which they pray has the television at their backs, Makkah so far away but not far away, simply through the walls of this hotel and over the square of the best school and its high walls that cannot protect them, over the loud and dirty streets of the kufar, through their homes of false idols and over the sea on which sail tankers of Saudi oil, over the shores of England and France and Germany, over the heads of their women who laugh and smoke and drink and tempt believers away from where he travels now, through Spain and Italy and Greece, its wine-drinking kufar, its women naked on beaches he turns away from, through the Balkans where thousands of Muslims were massacred and the West watched, then over the Mediterranean he has never seen and blood-soaked Palestine the Zionists occupy, his brothers and sisters living in camps since they were born, the holy city occupied by Christians and Jews, their polytheistic temples and churches, their worship of Ezra and the Messiah as if there is not One Lord, then south through Egypt and Sudan and across the Red Sea to the beaches of the kingdom where as a boy he played and swam with his older brothers, his mother and aunts and sisters in full abayas on blankets beneath umbrellas, and years later he and Khalid and Karim would drive there in their auto built by the far enemy and laugh and make silly jokes about nothing, even later sitting so closely together on a mirkaz in one of the restaurants on the water, eating fried fish and yogurt, again talking about nothing because they were nothing, because they were adrift on the sea of unbelief and none of them had even begun to prepare for the hajj, nor would they now, though the shahid is exempt, the shahid is exempt, and Bassam is nearly there, passing the two hills of Safa and Marwa and the eternal springs found by the faith of Abraham’s wife to the Al-Haram Mosque and its stone Ka’bah built by the hands of Abraham and his son and how can Ahmed al-Jizani not be proud? How will he not be so very proud?