What scared me the most during such nights was how different Mama became. She said words in front of me that made my cheeks blush and my heart shudder. Saliva gathered at the corners of her lips. She didn't look beautiful any more.
'Your heroine's boldness was to ask to be allowed to…?' she held the word in the air, staring at me, casting her hand slowly in a curve as if she was presenting a feast. 'To live.'
Her eyes fixed on me, expecting me to say something, to be outraged, to slap my thigh, sigh, click my tongue and shake my head. I faced my lap, pretending to be busy with something between my fingers, hoping the moment would pass. And when she started speaking again I was always relieved that her voice had come to fill the void.
'To live,' she repeated. 'And not because she had as much right to live as he, but because if he were to kill her his sons would live "motherless".' Mama covered her mouth with the back of her hand and giggled like a child. "Release me," your Scheherazade begged, "release me from the doom of death as a dole to these infants. You will find nobody among all the women in your realm to raise them as they should be raised." Stupid harlot. My guess: five, maybe ten years at the most before she got the sword. As soon as the "one sucking" became the "one walking", and her muscles, Scheherazade's fine, supple muscles…' Mama said, frowning in disgust. The ceiling light seemed too harsh on her face. I wondered if I should switch it off, switch on the side lamps instead. '… those so important for pleasing the King, the Mighty, the Majestic Shahryar, had loosened…' Her eyes were wet now, her lower lip quivered slightly. 'As soon as she was no longer tempting, useful; as soon as she was no longer beautifuclass="underline" whack! Gone with the head,' she said and then her own head dropped and her legs extended before her. I thought she was going to fall off the sofa, but she remained still, silent for a couple of minutes. I imagined how it might be to live without her. A warm swirl spun in my belly, something warm and dependable gripped my heart and sent a rush through me. I wasn't sure if it was fear or excitement that I felt at the thought of losing her. Then she seemed to wake up. She looked at me as if it was the first time we had met. She scanned the room, paused for a moment, then lit a cigarette. 'You should go to bed,' she said, looking away.
On the mornings after she was always nice. She liked to take me out driving. If it was a school day she would ask, 'Anything important today?' I would shrug my shoulders and she would say, 'I'll telephone the school and tell them you're not well' In the car she talked a lot and wasn't surprised by my silence. She didn't mind stopping under the pedestrian bridge that crossed over Gorgi Street so I could watch the bad boys hanging above the fast traffic by their arms and some, the truly brave ones, by their ankles. Normally, when we passed under them, she would ask me to shut my eyes. But on such mornings she was happy to park beside them and let me watch. Sometimes she would even say, 'I must admit, they are quite brave.' Then, 'Promise you would never do that. Promise you would always protect yourself.' Sometimes I nodded and sometimes I didn't.
On some mornings she took me all the way to town just to buy sesame sticks. Or, if she had been very ill the night before, she would take me to Signor II Calzoni's restaurant by the sea, in Gergarish, for grilled shrimp and spaghetti. In winter I ordered the beet-and-tomato soup with bread and cheese and bresaola. I liked the way the beet painted my spit and tongue purple for hours.
Signor II Calzoni had a big machine that squeezed oranges all on its own and he would take me to push the button that set the whole thing working, cutting oranges and squeezing them in front of you. I didn't like orange juice that much but some days I drank up to five glasses just to watch the thing work. After the meal I always got gelati. Mama ordered cappuccino and sipped it slowly, looking out on to the sea, squinting her eyes at the horizon where on a clear day we could see Malta, a giant biscuit floating on the sea.
Signor II Calzoni was always pleased to see us. He would take us to our table by the window and hover in search of conversation. He spoke about how much he missed Italy and how much he loved Libya. And occasionally he would chant, loud enough for all in the restaurant to hear, 'Long live the Guide,' towards a large mural he had had a couple of art students paint at one end of the restaurant. It showed the Colonel in his full military uniform, curling his eyebrows and looking very serious. And if the restaurant had a table of Revolutionary Committee men, or Mokhabarat, people we called Antennae, he chanted, 'El-Fateh, el-Fateh, el-Fateh,' punching the air with his fist until the waiters joined in. Sometimes the chef too came out and I got to see his tall, puffy white hat.
The things she told me pressed down on my chest, so heavy that it seemed impossible to carry on living without spilling them. I didn't want to break my promise -the promise she always forced me to give, sometimes over thirty times in one night, not to tell, to swear on her life, again and again, and then be warned, 'If you tell a living soul and I die my life will be on your neck' – so I tried to tell her. We were at Signor II Calzoni's restaurant. She kept interrupting me, pleading with me to stop. So I covered my ears, shut my eyes and spoke like a robot above her. She slapped the table and said, 'Please, Suleiman, I beg you, don't embarrass me,' and whispered sternly through flexed lips, 'A boy your age should never speak such things.' Then she changed her tone and said, 'Habibi, light of my eyes, promise you won't tell anyone. Especially Moosa. I know how much you love him, but nothing ever stays in that man's mouth. Promise.' I nodded, wrapping my arms round myself, doubling over: this was the only way I could keep it all inside.
Signor II Calzoni avoided coming to our table when he saw us like this. He would stand beside his cashier, pretending not to look.
Sometimes I couldn't get myself to eat, and Mama would think I was punishing her. 'What do you want from me?' she would whisper angrily across the table, 'I have given up everything for you. You're not even satisfied.'
If I began to cry, Signor II Calzoni would take me to squeeze more oranges, holding my hand and talking in his funny accent. Then, if the restaurant was completely empty, he would sit beside me, look out on to the sea and say, 'Ah. Look how beautiful your country is, Suleiman. Now it's mine too, no? I am also Libyan, like you. I speak like a Libyan, no?' 'No,' I would say just to make him laugh. He had a wonderful laugh. His entire body would bounce beside me. The seats were spring-upholstered and so I would do the same. And that made him blush in front of Mama. 'You should change your name from Signor II Calzoni to Signor al-Husseini.' That always made him bounce.