She walks behind him to the gate. She stands there with Muntaha at her side. Muntaha despairs of trying to shoo the children, especially now that the time for what they came to see has almost come. Over time and with the gradual waning of Kamileh’s eyesight, Muntaha has grown accustomed to whispering to Kamileh what she needed to know about what was going on in front of her that she could no longer see, as if Muntaha wanted to give back to her lifelong companion what old age had taken away from her.
Eliyya can’t stop hugging and kissing her, and she gives in but does not cry. She wants him to stop, and he does, then takes the suitcases to the car and comes back for one final embrace. Kamileh calls out. The taxi driver comes over and she tells him not to drive too fast taking Eliyya to Beirut and tells him to wait in the airport with him to make sure about his flight and to stop by to see her on his way back to let her know the plane took off with him. The driver promises to do everything she asked and then she hears the car doors shut, one then the other. She hears Eliyya’s voice as he addresses her for the last time. ‘Mother.’ The driver turns the ignition. Kamileh knows that the car will travel around fifty metres before turning left onto the main road. After enough time has passed for the car to disappear around the bend, she asks Muntaha, ‘Did he look back?’
Muntaha pretends not to hear the question. Kamileh repeats, ‘Did Eliyya look back this way before turning the corner?’
‘He looked. Yes, he looked…’ Muntaha lies to her.
A little later, after all the neighbours have left without saying a word all the way to their homes, knowing that Kamileh’s sense of hearing has grown sharper as her vision has grown dim; and after the schoolchildren get bored of looking at her once she goes back to her seat on the balcony near the dahlias; and after all the little kids on their unexpected day off head to the alleys or the video arcades; and after Muntaha claims to have to go home to make lunch, about which Kamileh keeps quiet, knowing well that most of the time Muntaha never makes anything for lunch and just snacks on little things while standing at the sink; after all that, Kamileh takes a deep breath before making herself a cup of coffee and going back to life as usual.
She gropes around the bench and the low tables searching for coffee cups and ashtrays, and while doing this she stumbles upon a notebook left there on the bench. At first she doesn’t know it’s the notebook in which Eliyya wrote all his notes about his trip. She doesn’t know if he’s accidentally forgotten it and would regret that and ask his mother to send it to him one way or another, or if he’s left it there on the bench on the balcony on purpose. However, when later that afternoon she asks Muntaha, who returns to Kamileh’s on this difficult day, to read what is written in the notebook, the first thing she discovers are words that reminded her of the Bible: ‘And Adam knew Eve, his wife, and she was with child and gave birth to Cain. And so she said that she had been blessed with a man from the Lord. Then she was again with child and gave birth to his brother Abel. Abel was a shepherd and Cain ploughed the fields. And it happened after some time that Cain made an offering of fruits of the earth to the Lord; and Abel also made an offering of the fatted, first-born lambs. The Lord looked upon Abel and his offering, but upon Cain and his offering He did not look …’
Muntaha gets tired of reading and Kamileh gets tired of listening. Muntaha turns a few pages: ‘I got more than seven contradictory stories of what started the incident, as if everyone suddenly started shooting at the same time in all directions. Every person I asked had his own story …’
Muntaha’s attention is drawn to a numbered list that she and Kamileh later discover is a list of everyone killed in the Burj al-Hawa incident. Eliyya didn’t mention them by name, but by their occupations or their family status. Muntaha starts reading about each one and pausing so she and Kamileh can figure out who each one is: ‘Driver of an American pick-up truck, 1946 Dodge, worked in export transportation, to Syria and Jordan, sometimes as far as Iraq on long hauls, 32 years old, married, four children, the youngest one week old.’
‘That’s Saeed al-Abras!’
‘Tailor’s apprentice, unmarried, 25 years old.’
‘Farid Badwi al-Semaani!’ Muntaha knew that one.
‘Mechanic trained in a local auto repair shop, had just gotten a promotion at work, manager started giving him some simple repairs to do on his own, unmarried, 25 years old.
‘Arabic teacher, elementary and middle school levels, and chief editor of a periodical school magazine calling for liberation and education for girls and other progressive ideals, liked corresponding with famous great thinkers of the time and received letters from them which he preserved with care, 26 years old, unmarried.’
‘That’s Michel al-Rami.’
The descriptions, ages and occupations go on and on:‘Watchman hired by olive grove proprietors who determines the beginning of harvest and wards off encroachers and stops goat herders from going through the groves and turns a blind eye to the gleaners who come to collect the stray olives at the end of the season, carried a gun as part of his job, 38 years old, seven children, the last born three months after his death and named after him.
‘Butcher, 38 years old, seven children, the oldest 15 years old.
‘Taxi driver, Barqa — Tripoli route and Tripoli — Beirut route sometimes, 27 years old, married with four children.
‘18 years old, not in school as he found it unbearably difficult to do maths and French so he dropped out, not employed despite having made a futile attempt at learning to be a barber and then a carpenter, still young, his life hadn’t yet begun.’
‘Isn’t that your cousin, Muntaha? Your aunt Zahiyya’s son?’
‘Employee at one of the banks in the city — the Lebanese-African Bank — had just got a new job only two weeks earlier, unmarried, 26 years old.
‘Clerk assigned to the judge presiding at the local government building on Tuesdays and Thursdays, 26 years old, married with two children.
‘Australian expatriate who’d come back to the country a few weeks before after hearing news that his relatives were facing major threats, 33 years old, married, had four children at the time of the incident, two were later killed in the ensuing violence.
‘Not known to have stable employment though did well for himself. Did a lot of buying and selling, was said that one day before the incident he got a good deal on some guns and sold a bunch of them to his cousins and some to the family of the enemy, too, some people wanted to believe he was shot by one of those guns he sold to his enemies, married with five children.’
And then suddenly, just before the end: ‘Gambler, opened some clubs here and there, partnered with others here and there, played cards and fixed the deck, 42 years old, married, not blessed with children.’
Muntaha reads that one and stops.
‘That’s Yusef, isn’t it?’ Kamileh says.
‘Maybe.’ Muntaha regrets having read what Eliyya wrote about his father. Something caught Kamileh’s attention. She grabs Muntaha’s hand. ‘Read that to me again.’
Muntaha obliges. ‘Gambler, opened some clubs here and there, partnered with others here and there, played cards and fixed the deck, 42 years old, married.’
‘Is that it?’
‘Yes, that’s it.’
‘You’re a liar, Muntaha,’ Kamileh says, swiping the notebook from her hands.