Here’s the plan, he told his wife not long after they settled into their home in Nazareth. I’ll put together some money and then we’ll return to Jaffa.
Milia hung her head and said she would prefer Bethlehem.
Why Bethlehem?
She did not answer. Through her eyelashes she saw the golden halo flickering. She had not told her dream to anyone. What would she say? That she had agreed to have him as a husband because of the dream? And that she had come to be in this place because she had heard a voice calling her, saying to her, Go to Nazareth?
The images that floated in and out of Milia’s head plied together and tangled. The woman she saw in the dream was carrying a tiny child. She gave the child to Milia and disappeared, a figure in a long blue gown. Milia watched the blue color of it undulate across the wadi and cover it entirely. The baby whom this woman had left in the little girl’s hands was dark skinned. Its eyes were shut and it was wrapped tightly in bunting — or perhaps a shroud. A penumbra of light formed a halo over his little head: a blue light hovering on the knees of a little girl of seven. She sits in front of a stone monument abutting the wadi. Behind her is an ancient crumbling structure half in ruins, perhaps a very old church built of white stone. The woman comes out of nowhere and then disappears just as suddenly, leaving her dress behind to move across the wadi and blanket it. Milia stands up suddenly to reach for and grip the hem of the gown but she senses herself falling. She clutches the baby to her chest and steps backward but her foot catches on a rock. As she begins to fall she opens her eyes and takes a deep slow breath.
The lit oil lamp sitting in front of the wooden icon box suspended in a corner of the liwan flickers and all but goes out. The wick glows blue. The blue woman who has left her field of vision — who has abandoned her eyes — enters the icon box, its brown color now a palette of reds and golds. She closes her eyes but the blue woman has already returned. She sets the baby down on Milia’s knee and disappears again in her blue gown and the blue fabric covers the wadi. Milia comes out of the wadi carrying the baby boy. She puts out her hand to take hold of the hem of the blue gown. Afraid, she steps back. And she falls.
The next morning Musa came and informed her of the bridegroom. And he said: Bethlehem. So she hung her head and agreed. And then he said, No, I got that wrong. He is from Nazareth, not from Bethlehem. So she nodded again and said yes.
Had she heard the names of both towns in her dream? Had the blue woman told her the name of the town where she would live? Milia does not remember any voices in that dream. But when she smiles at her husband after he asks her, Why Bethlehem? she is certain (without knowing why) that the two towns’ names emerged together from the bedrock of her dream and that she cannot answer his question.
Was it true that she had told the Nazarene she loved him?
She saw herself through Mansour’s eyes, leaning over the pot of basil and breathing in the fragrance coming from the mixture of soil and water and perfume until she was dizzy. The man saw her figure from behind and decided immediately that he would not finally leave Beirut without her.
When I see you I feel thirsty, he told her.
What does the beautiful moon think of the beautiful moon? he asked her.
I am standing here like this to watch over the basil’s perfume, he said.
She heard his voice. She turned around and the face she saw was so very like her brother Musa’s face. She felt light-headed: was it the mingling effects of the basil’s fragrance and the perfume of this man’s words? His words took on the aroma of basil and his footsteps in the garden just across from theirs made a rustling sound that left her trembling. The sensation traveled from her neck to her lower back. But only once did she actually speak to him. It was October and the first rains. Milia stood in her long indigo-blue skirt and white blouse watching the trees lose their leaves when she heard a voice coming from their direction.
It’s you. You’re the one.
I’m what? she asked.
You know what I’m talking about, he said.
Me!
I love you, he said.
Why? she asked.
I love you, and I want you, he said.
Me!
She shrouded herself in her pallor and went into the house. That is how Mansour would describe her. He would say that she had wrapped herself up in her own paleness; she had gone inside the pure white that was her. She lowered her head and said she agreed.
Disappearing into the old house, she sensed his eyes as nails driven into her body between her shoulders at the very top of her back. Her neck hurt her. When Musa accused her of already knowing the man, of having fallen in love with him without telling her brother, she could find nothing to say. She reached her hand around to her upper back to pull out those nails and said yes.
Mansour is sleeping and Milia tries to fall asleep. Closing her eyes, she feels a trembling on the sole of her right foot. She falls onto the stairs. Musa tells her not to be afraid of this long steep flight of wooden stairs. Seashore. Water. Everything is tinted a strong clear blue. Milia is climbing the steep rickety stairs, barely more than a ladder. Sister Milana stands at the bottom gripping the wooden staircase and shaking it. Milia is high on the stairs now but beneath her the wood shudders. Holding on tightly, she attempts to take another step. She looks down to see waves and foam and suddenly she tumbles head over heels like a clown performing a wild acrobatic trick. Her head falls first and her body stretches along the steps as if she had lain down on them. She goes into a somersault. The fall is swift but the staircase seems interminable.
The nun disappeared. Musa was stretching out his arms to catch her. Musa toppled into the water and the sea swallowed him. Milia stood on a rock amidst the waves, her shorts stained with sea grass and salt stinging her eyes. She searched desperately for her brother in the waves but she could not see him anywhere. A hand came out and pushed her into the waters. She was drowning — she knew it — and she felt her throat constrict. She opened her eyes. She licked the salt from her lips and saw only the darkness.
Milia sat on the edge of the bed and pressed her hand to her chest trying to quiet her loud rapid heartbeat. Her heart was erupting, spreading throughout her body. She felt it in her neck and temples and in the soles of her feet. Every part of her shook violently.
Why this fear? Of what was she afraid?
A phantom smile played on the woman’s lips in the gloom. The dream came back to her — that old dream which had abandoned her three years before when she met Najib Karam for the first time and sensed that this young man would swab the dreams from her eyes and help her into the world. But Najib had disappeared from her life and the dream of the sea and the wooden stairs had gone with him. And here she was now, sitting on the edge of the bed in Room Ten in the Hotel Massabki in Shtoura, asking questions, knowing the answers, filled with disquiet.
In my dream, I fell, Milia said to her mother, and now my foot hurts. She heard her mother bawl. Stop this foolishness! You’re as bad as your grandmama. Well, you’re a young woman now and it’s high time we find you a man.