Farewell, Damascus Page 3

  Zain tried to get down off the operating table, but nearly fell, so the nurse helped her.

  “Things went well,” the doctor informed her reassuringly. “Don’t worry, you’ll be able to have children in the future.”

  Still under the effect of the anaesthesia, Zain said groggily, “I’ll be going now,” not realizing what had come out of my mouth.

  “I won’t let you leave yet,” the doctor replied gently. “You lie down for a while in the next room. Then I’ll take you home. Don’t worry. It’s all over.”

  “I can walk home,” she insisted.

  Half-chuckling, he replied, “You sleep now. Don’t worry!” and left the torture chamber.

  Zain fell fast asleep. After some time she woke up refreshed, but with a pain in her abdomen that went away after a while thanks to a dose of medication.

  Ever so slowly she got dressed and, forgetting the earlier conversation with the doctor, decided to leave, though without knowing exactly where to go. She lumbered toward the door, trying to make her getaway. But before she made it out of the room, the doctor gently took her arm, saying, “Come. I want to measure your blood pressure.”

  She came docilely back. A few minutes later he announced, “You’ve got a strong constitution, and you’re fine. Even so, I’m going to drive you home. You need to take it easy.”

  From the wall clock behind him Zain discovered to her astonishment that it was four in the afternoon. She’d been there nearly all day! Again she told him she could make it home on her own, but he wouldn’t hear of it. Zain still didn’t understand exactly what was happening to her. As she left the clinic with him, her will no longer her own, she kept quiet, trying to focus on revealing her identity. She told him she was living in the building across the street from the main entrance to Subki Park.

  “So is that where you’d like to go?” he asked in a familiar tone, as though she were his sister or his neighbor. So does he know me, or doesn’t he? Does he know where I really live? Why should I lie to him?

  “Yes,” she fibbed. “That’s where my house is.”

  As Zain got ready to leave the house with the doctor, his wife suddenly asked her in French, “Who are you, anyway? When you were unconscious, you started quoting poetry that my husband said was from Shakespeare!”

  Zain didn’t say anything. She wished she could tell her the truth: that her marriage had failed and that she hoped her divorce would succeed. But she had to keep up the pretence, for the time being at least.

  The doctor’s wife hesitated briefly. Then, without giving Zain a chance to spout another lie, she stuffed a prescription into her hand and practically shouted in her face, “Neither of us believed you were the daughter of a nightclub dancer—especially my husband!”

  Then she slammed the door behind them. For all Zain knew, the doctor had known from the start that she was lying, and was trying to pull the wool over their eyes with her clever scenarios. For all she knew, he’d suspected from the start that she was Zain, his lawyer friend’s daughter. For all she knew, he’d sensed the tragedy that had come out of her crazy infatuation, her Romeo and Juliet complex, the kind of headstrong passion that thumbs its nose at social norms and family expectations. Maybe he’d seen pictures of her from the wedding party. Or maybe he’d even been one of the guests.

  As she walked down the steps with him, leaning on his arm, he looked at her as if to say, “Do you really think I don’t recognize you, Zain?”

  Whether he did or not, all that mattered to her now was to keep going, to get out of the painful spot she’d gotten stuck in. She was so scared and mixed up, she was telling lies that contradicted each other, and there were things she didn’t want to talk to anybody about, such as her feelings of defeat and all her mistakes. She was trying to extricate herself from the love net she’d spun in luminous, intense moments now past.

  As she thought back on all the humiliation she’d endured in her marriage, she didn’t feel as though she’d just taken an innocent life. In fact, she felt she’d come to its rescue. What she’d killed was the needless degradation this little boy or girl would have been subjected to now that a one-time sweetheart had turned into an executioner.

  The doctor didn’t say a word as he drove her to Subki Park. When they arrived, she got out of the car, went into the building she’d directed him to, and waved gratefully goodbye, bracing herself against the pain. She stood for a few minutes in the entranceway, praying that none of its residents would come in or out and see her skulking there. She waited to hear the doctor drive away, taking the day’s events with him. Once she was assured he was out of sight, she walked over to Subki Park and collapsed onto a bench. Knowing she might be bleeding, she sat with her legs pressed together, trying to decide what to do and where to go.

  Chapter Two

  When Dr. Manahili dropped Zain off at the door, she staggered so badly that he didn’t have the heart to leave her. He decided he had to take her to her actual house, wherever it happened to be.

  He drove to Mt. Qasioun, where he parked in the square and sat waiting in his car. She doesn’t seem to realize I didn’t believe her story about being the daughter of a dancer at the Siryana Club. The girl’s a lousy liar, but she certainly is brave. She’s the only person who’s ever come for an abortion all by herself, and I know she can’t possibly be her stated age of twenty-four. I’ve been around too long to fall for a claim like that. All the others have come with a husband, a sister, a mother or a girlfriend—in other words, with some sort of moral support. When she came to make the appointment, she was plastered with makeup to convince me she was the daughter of this imaginary nightclub dancer, but I was skeptical. Granted, some nightclub dancers care more about educating their kids than some high-society ladies. But that girl’s no skid row kid. For one thing, the diamond bracelet she tried to pay me with is worth a lot of money. It’s obvious that she comes from an aristocratic family and that the bracelet is an heirloom— unless she stole it, of course. Besides, nightclub dancers and their daughters know the value of the money they work so hard for, and there’s no way they’d give up a diamond bracelet to pay a doctor like me. In any case, I’m charmed by her innocent gaffs, and I don’t blame her for thinking she could buy me with a diamond bracelet, since I’ve got a pretty bad reputation around here. The fact is, sometimes I agree to perform illegal abortions for the sake of the unborn children. I’m not worried about the money. It’s my wife who worries about that, since she’s got her heart set on us settling in Paris and opening a clinic there. I don’t want to see any child be born into a broken home and suffer the way I did. Zain probably suffered a lot herself from her paternal aunts in the big house in Ziqaq Al Yasmin, where I used to play with her dad when we were little boys. This is assuming, of course, that the mystery girl really is Zain Khayyal. When my wife heard her raving under the effect of the anesthesia, she jumped at the chance to ask her what her name was. She didn’t exactly admit to being Zain Khayyal. She said a name I’m not sure I understood right, but that’s what I think I heard. She was muttering so incoherently most of the time, she might have been saying something else.

  My wife asked her the question in French and she answered in Arabic, “My name’s Zain… Zain Khayyal.” At least that’s what I think she said. Despite her valiant attempts to learn Arabic, my wife still doesn’t understand it very well, and she asked me what the girl was saying. “Oh, nothing,” I told her. “She’s talking nonsense.” When a woman is lying terrified on an operating table with a gas mask on her face and a needle in her vein, she has no idea what sorts of secrets she’s giving away. When I hear the things patients say, I begin to hate some and sympathize with others. This girl’s one of the ones I sympathize with. She was doing her best to keep her subconscious under control, but nobody can hold out against drugs like these. The prick of a needle in the right place and a few drops of the right drug, and the doors of the mind fly open like a bank’s vault at the touch of a seasoned burglar.

  He
thought back on the various scenes subsequent to her arrival at his clinic. With every step she took and every muffled groan she released, she seemed to stalk his very thoughts. He remembered supporting her on his arm as she got into his car and asking her where she wanted him to take her. “To Subki Park,” she’d replied mechanically. “To the house across from the park entrance.” Hoping to catch her off guard, he’d asked, “Which entrance?” “The main entrance,” came her curt reply. He could tell she was lying. He knew her father’s house—if she was Zain Khayyal—was on Abu Rummana Street in the Sahat Al Midfaa neighborhood. So he figured she must be directing him to where she lived with her husband. No, maybe she’s still not telling the truth. But as bad as it is, I love the way she lies.

  Zain had pointed to a two-storey building across from one of the entrances to Subki Park. On the main door he had seen a sign that read, “Building for Sale.”

  “Here,” she had announced abruptly with a wince. She seemed to have difficulty even lifting her arm to point to the place.

  As Dr. Manahili got out of his car at Sahat Al Muhajirin, he was haunted by the memory of Zain’s muted dignity and her amateurish fibs.

  He paced up and down the square, trying in vain to get her out of his tortured thoughts. I knew that wasn’t her house. She’s the worst liar I’ve ever met, which makes me feel even closer to her. Or maybe what draws me to her is her guts. I didn’t mention anything about this to my wife, and I’ve hardly been able to admit it even to myself. But in spite of all the problems here, I don’t want to move to Paris. I want to stay in Damascus. When I let her out of my car, I was so worried about her I couldn’t get myself to leave. So I drove to the end of the street that runs alongside Subki Park and pulled over for a while, not sure what to do. She’s the type that doesn’t like other people butting into her affairs. That was obvious even when she was still partly under the anesthesia.

  If, as I’m inclined to believe, she really is Zain Khayyal, then we’re bonded by the fact that we’re both orphans. We orphans know by telepathy who loves us and who doesn’t. We’ve learned from bitter experience how to read people’s intentions toward us. We’ve also learned to support each other in secret, and openly too sometimes. So when she claimed to be the daughter of a nightclub dancer, I pretended to believe her. I kept telling myself that some nightclub dancers are more cultured and warm-hearted than some high-society ladies. I ought to know! Sometimes a celebrity will come to me because she suspects she might be pregnant by her dark-skinned lover and is afraid her blonde, blue-eyed husband might notice that his child is half black. One woman, after getting pregnant by a black waiter, came to me saying something ridiculous about getting pregnant while she was taking a bath because the maid hadn’t cleaned the tub well enough!

  My hunch had been right. In my rear-view mirror I saw her leaving the building where I’d dropped her off. She’d hidden in its stairwell, as I’d suspected she would, and had come out thinking I was gone. She crossed the street and walked wobbly-legged into Subki Park. I didn’t spy on her after that. I knew she would collapse onto a park bench to soak up some sunshine and recoup her strength, then probably head somewhere else, though she hadn’t decided where yet. I drove toward Sahat Al Muhajirin, a haven for Damascenes when their lives are in turmoil. When they’re having a hard time, they tend to retreat into silence until they explode. About to explode myself by this time, I was tempted to follow her to Subki Park. I wanted to tell her, “I was careful to perform your abortion in such a way that you’ll be able to have children in the future. Your courage is an inspiration to me, a cowardly orphan who was hurt as a child but never had the guts to speak up to his father.”

  Dr. Manahili paced up and down Sahat Al Muhajirin, looking out periodically at the orchards that stretched out below him. This girl, who might be the Zain I know, has brought up sadness from my past. But what she did was a good thing. She had the pluck to abort a baby that would have ended up like me as a little boy, shuttling back and forth between two broken homes, subjected to insults, hatred, and even physical abuse. My stepmother seemed to take delight in me getting sick, since this gave her the chance to torture me on the pretext of taking care of me. And her remedy of choice: an enema! My father didn’t object to her prescription. In fact, he used to thank her for taking care of me and would go off to work with his mind at rest. Torture by enema on the pretext of “treating” a child was common in those days. Raising the instrument of torture by a single centimeter would be enough to send waves of excruciating pain around the anus’s tender periphery. So when she elevated the enema bag, the soap and water mixture would flow more forcefully into my innards, and I’d feel as though my gut was about to explode. But I wouldn’t let myself cry. Then she’d raise it a little higher, hoping I’d cry out in pain and beg her to stop. My insides were being torn apart, but instead of crying, I’d just flash her a defiant stare. When I’m in a lot of pain, I generally just scream and let it out. But I was determined not to give her what she wanted. Instead of begging and pleading, I looked at her with cold loathing. I knew better than to expect compassion from my tormenter, and I could sense with a child’s subtle intuition that if I begged for mercy, she’d just want to hurt me even more. Sadists aren’t out to kill their victims, since if they did that, they’d rob themselves of the pleasure of continuing to watch them suffer.

  I feel sure this girl must have been subjected to something similar—if not physical torment, then the psychological variety.

  As he paced his concrete platform overlooking the city, Dr. Manahili wished he could take Zain to the rustic cafe near Qubbat Al Sayyar. Of course, she wouldn’t be able to climb the dirt staircase that leads up to the highest section of the cafe. But she could have a cup of coffee at a table near the entrance. Wait - I wouldn’t let her have even a cup of coffee now. She’d have to settle for some chamomile tea, mint tea, or… Oh, right, I forgot to tell her about that. But I did remember to write her a prescription… What’s happening to me? Am I falling in love with this girl when I’m old enough to be her father? Or am I just taken by the fact that she had the courage to get an abortion all on her own despite her young age, the way I’ve always wished my mother had done? Isn’t it true that I married my wife because I knew she was barren? Of course, she isn’t barren exactly. She needs surgery on her fallopian tubes, and if she had the operation, she’d be able to have children. But out of selfishness I’ve never told her so. I’m no saint, that’s for sure.

  When my wife wasn’t looking, I put the diamond bracelet back on the girl’s wrist while she was recovering from the operation. I was impressed by the fact that even when she was delirious from the anesthesia, she didn’t say a word about her partner, as if she were determined to take sole responsibility for the abortion.

  After downing a cup of black coffee, Dr. Manahili went back to Sahat Al Muhajirin, parked his car, and walked down Al Qasr Al Jumhuri Street along the railroad track, to his right the Presidential Palace and the Al Idlibi Family villa. He passed through Sheikh Muhyi Al Din, Al Jisr Al Abyad, Arnous, and Shaalana on his way to Subki Park. I confess, I’m worried about her. I want to make sure she’s all right. Where has she gone now? To her husband’s house? To her father’s house? And where would either of them be?

  Dr. Manahili decided to pay Zain’s father a visit the following day. That way he could confirm whether she really was Zain Khayyal whose wedding he’d been invited to. No… I’m not in love with her. But she’s the daughter I would have hoped to have, and I’m going to support her. Or rather, she’s the daughter I didn’t want to have, but that I admire with all my heart! I love her. Yes, I love her the way I would have loved the daughter I was fortunate enough not to have. She’s got plenty of faults, foremost among which is her weakness for trying to lie her way through hard situations and doing an incredibly bad job of it. At the same time, she’s brave and defiant. She makes her own decisions and acts on them.

  I suppose I’m a liar too, but after so many years of pr
actice, I’ve mastered the art of prevarication. Zain—if that’s who she is—will never know I love her, and neither will anybody else. Love her? There goes the artist inside me babbling away like a lunatic… How could I be in love with somebody whose name I’m not even sure about? I’m just a crazy old man who needs to learn to keep his feelings in check! How could I be in love with a girl who’s young enough to be my daughter? That’s ridiculous… But whoever said love was rational? On the contrary, it’s the irrational par excellence, or so it appears to be at this moment. My feelings for her are so confused. She’s stirred up all the pain in my heart, and suddenly I’m remembering whole strings of events I thought I’d forgotten all about. It’s as if she’s aborted my ability to keep bad memories at bay.

  He walked back to his car and drove to the Arnous neighborhood where he and his wife lived. He was afraid she might see him as she left their house on her way to the French Cultural Center and the elementary schools where she volunteered as a French teacher. The last thing he would have wanted to do was hurt her feelings. A goodhearted woman, she had agreed to come with him to a country she knew nothing about, and had worked hard to adapt to life without knowing anything about the tormenting thoughts that haunted him. Yet despite his worry that she might spot him, he hung around Subki Park to see what Zain—or whatever her name was—had done with herself.

  My father, a government employee who was always getting razzed by his subordinates, used to beat me. I was his scapegoat, and he would take all his bitterness and frustrations from work out on my little body. As his switch seared my back he would hiss, “Why didn’t you die? Your mother did everything she could to abort you. And now you’re tormenting your poor ‘Auntie’!” I was determined to survive despite all my disappointments, but when I went to my stepmother for comfort, all I got was a cold, disapproving stare. Meanwhile, she pampered her own little boy, the one she’d conceived with her new husband. After working for a while at a grocery store, I got a job working for a blacksmith who sharpened people’s knives for them. Meanwhile I was sharpening my own knives, studying at night on the sly for my middle school certificate. Then I worked as an elementary teacher and managed to finish high school. When I was a teenager, my father avoided me. He wouldn’t even look me in the eye. In fact, he was so intent on dodging me that he wouldn’t go to the kitchen until he’d heard me turn on the light in the bathroom. Not realizing I was studying, he used to make fun of my interest in books, and he resented having to pay the bill for the electricity I used up by reading at night. So when he asked me what I was reading, I’d tell him I was reading the Qur’an, since nobody would dare scold his son for reading the book of God.