I got up and went into the bathroom. I closed the door cautiously behind me, taking care not to make any noise. I filled the tub with water and quietly stretched out in it. I reached my hand under the water to my taut erection. I closed my eyes on the memory of Aliya and the scene of her domed breasts under her last wet dress, and I began to stroke and stroke. I stroked until the climax of desire and pleasure. Afterward, I felt empty, ashamed, and guilty for what I had done with her when she was dead. And I wept.
I hurried to wash up. I put on my work clothes and ate a couple of dates with a mouthful of cold milk. Then I went out, leaving Pilar in my bed and lighting a cigarette as soon as I passed through the door of the building.
When I reached the office, I found Antonio sitting in the truck, smoking as he waited for me. He had already finished bundling and loading the newspapers we had to deliver. I sat behind the steering wheel next to him and turned the ignition. We set off as usual, with me driving. He slapped my right thigh and said in a significant tone, “I knew you’d arrive late …. So, how was your night?”
“Perfect,” I said. “But I left her sleeping in my apartment.”
“Don’t worry,” he said. “Pilar’s a good girl. I’ve known her a long time. By the way, she’s especially attracted to foreigners. Her last boyfriend was Italian.”
I gathered my laundry from the clothesline. Remembering what Pilar had said, I made sure to close the kitchen window so the pigeons wouldn’t get in. I had resolved to go to my father’s club that night. Pronouncing the Arabic words badly that morning, Rosa had said tonight’s party would be beautiful. But that isn’t what impelled me to go. Rather, it was my father. I had to find a chance to talk to him, or else we could pick a time to meet. My new father who had emerged, just like that, in my life here. As surprising as a head bursting out of the water after being submerged for a long time. I wondered whether my father still remembered the evening of the festival when Aliya drowned. Did he still remember her like I did after all these years?
CHAPTER 7
I arrived at the club at a quarter to midnight in order to beat the rush. As with every other club, the dancing started after one o’clock and would continue until the first rays of dawn appeared to dispel the dark.
Club Qashmars was in Veneras Street, on the left-hand side as you approach (as I always did) from Plaza de Santo Domingo. It was in the basement of an old building, and it may have been used as a storage basement at first and during the days of the Spanish Civil War. But at some point along the way, a door leading to the narrow street had been put in. The space was initially used as a shop for selling drinks, then later as a club after my father and his girlfriend, Rosa, had leased it and renovated it for that purpose. Across from the club, on the right-hand side of the street, was a shop owned by a Chinese family who sold groceries, nuts, soft drinks, and cigarettes until very late at night, which they could do because the family lived in the back section of the store.
The outer door of the club was black and made of wood. I found a young woman crying in front of it. Her boyfriend was trying to make things right. He kissed her, but she pushed him away gently and wiped her eyes. They were standing exactly in front of the handwritten phrases on the door. When I reached for the door handle, they moved a little out of the way.
After the wooden door, another door followed, made of an iron grate. It was open and chained to the wall. Then a stairway went down about seven feet, with a turn in the middle. It was covered with a dark red carpet, though it had become nearly black from absorbing smoke and from the multitude of shoes passing over it. That smoke, together with the din of the music, was the first thing that struck me when I opened the black, wooden door. Next was the noise of conversation and laughter rising up to me. I recognized Rosa’s laugh, then my father’s, after I heard someone yell “cabrón,” which is Spanish for “asshole.” When I descended the last step, I found them standing around the bar. As it was, there weren’t more than fifteen people there, all of them gathered around my father, with glasses in their hands and laughing.
Fatima was in her permanent spot behind the bar, near the cash register. As soon as my father saw me, he called to me extravagantly and led me over to the group. He introduced me to those who were standing there with a theatrical gesture: “Saleem. This is Saleem.” Then he proceeded with their names, pointing at each of them and putting his finger on their chests, including the girls, for whom he would set his finger between their breasts or even on them, taking it away quickly with a comic motion, making them all laugh. There were Germans, Dutch, Austrians, and Spaniards. As for the last one, who was short and fat, he said, “This is Jesús, the cabrón,” and they all burst out laughing.
He didn’t tell them that I was his son, but rather “Saleem.” Just “Saleem.” Then, when I stood next to him, he wrapped his arm around my shoulders to demonstrate for them the intimacy of our relationship.
Rosa asked me, “Anything to drink?”
“Nothing, thanks,” I said. “Not now. I’ll order something for myself in a bit.”
My father was speaking with some of them in German, others in English. With the Spaniards he spoke a limited number of words, most of them curses. But whenever necessary, he got help from Fatima to translate, or from Rosa, with whom he spoke three languages: German, English, and a bit of Arabic. He held a glass in one hand and a cigarette in the other. Nevertheless, he never stopped using his hands while speaking, waving them around. He would often wrap the arm which ended in a cigarette around the necks of the others. But once he discarded the cigarette, his fingers would grab wherever they landed, pinching the skin of those standing around him, who were intoxicated by his noisy presence.
New customers kept arriving, coming down across the black entryway with its red carpet, which looked like an outstretched tongue. It was like an open mouth vomiting out people, each of whom came to the circle around my father and started joking with him. Their circle grew larger and more crowded, and because most of them knew each other, little by little I found myself alone on the edge of the circle. I didn’t know anybody, and I didn’t find a way in. I felt incapable of joining in their jokes and matching their noisy laughter. So I took myself quietly away toward the bar and sat on a stool between the beer taps and the cash register, opposite the place where Fatima would always stand. I greeted her, and she smiled sweetly. Her hands didn’t stop wiping the glasses with a towel tied to the edge of the white work apron hanging from her neck like a cook’s apron.
“What would you like: German beer or Spanish beer?” she asked.
“Neither,” I replied. “I don’t drink beer or any alcoholic drinks. I’ll take a Diet Coke.”
“You really don’t drink?! Oh my God, that’s great!” She showed her surprise, but I didn’t know how serious she was being.
“And you?”
“I don’t drink alcohol either. And if I sometimes have to, to be polite, I’ll drink a non-alcoholic beer.”
“How long have you been in Spain?” I asked.
“About four years.”
“And how long have you worked here?”
“For six months, ever since it opened.”
“How? I mean, how did you find this job?”
She leaned her head back and laughed, trading a dry glass for a wet one to wipe. “It was a coincidence. Or luck. I’m not sure which. I was passing by one morning, and I went into the Chinese shop across the way — do you know it? I wanted to buy some notebooks, pens, and so on. You know, school supplies for my sister. She’s young, fourteen years old, and I want her to finish school and not drop out like I did.”