“But what was exceptional in the man’s life?” I said.
“He was like every other human being, I think. And death could Ve mistaken him for another person. He was weak and didn’t know the meaning of life, didn’t know why God created him,” she said. “Like most of us.”
It didn’t make much sense to me and I wondered if Aw-Adan had told her a story whose details she had half-forgotten. I asked her, after a long pause, if this was so.
As usual, she was unwilling to admit there were gaps in the story she had told me. So she changed the subject. She said that we could play hide-and-seek until I fell asleep.
She hid; I sought her out.
VII
Did I, in the act of looking, bring into being a world in which there existed not only Misra but many other persons as well? Did I, as a result of this my stare, bring into existence a life of memories in which I am not the rememberer but the remembered? I — who did surrender myself wholly to Misra and her world; I — who existed in a look I myself couldn’t have seen or known of; I — who had lived in a universe dark as a photographer’s room, a universe developing into identifiable beings, some in duplicate, others in as many copies as one wanted. A look? Or a touch?
For me, life began in her hands and it was in her touch that I began to exist. Not in the savage stare which was so primitive it penetrated to the depth of her guilt, a savage stare which stirred in her soul a selfless desire to give and give and give and therefore be, exist only in the giving. Is this why I touched her whenever the chance presented itself to me? And is this why her physical absence upset me greatly when I was tiny — because I couldn’t reprint, on the screen of my undeveloped memory, my image of her in as many copies as I wanted? Anyway, my life was in her hands and she could do what she wanted with it and she did very well by it. Yes, by all accounts, she satisfied my uncles and aunts and other relations and was able to obtain their approval — although there were secrets between her and myself, secrets to which no other person had access. These secrets comprised things we did together, she and I; they consisted of games we played in our room when darkness fell and the silence of night engulfed all and everything and we went under the bedcovers and she told me stories or taught me things she wasn’t supposed to. These secrets included the fact that I knew everything she did. For example, one of my uncles used to come and knock on the small window of our room after midnight and Misra would get out of bed and wash and prepare and wait for a second knock. At times she would open the door and he would enter and make love to her on the floor or she would follow him to another place. Often, I pretended as if I were asleep. But at times I would cry so violently I would spoil the night for them, she would get back into bed with me and would calm me down, hold me between her breasts and would whisper something in a serious tone — either, “I hope you’ll learn to be on your own like all other children of your age”; or, her eyes misted with tears of anguish, she would say, “I will kill you unless you behave yourself. I’ll strangle you — so as to live my own life.” Then she would place her index and middle fingers on her closed eyes and the fingers would rest there, as though they were the holes of a flute. And she would continue: “I will kill you or I will kill myself.” I would cry more furiously and would wet myself in the enraged frenzy of a pervasive self-expression, and her tears would drip on me. She would lift me up, disregarding the mess of my moisture and the fact that she was dressed in her most elegant dress, and she would rock me to silence. She would place me within her reach, either on the floor or on a stool. If she moved away from me, if her hand didn’t lay on me, she knew I would burst into another convulsive cry and would also vomit or cough or do both. After a long bath, I would sit up and, as though nothing had occurred, would play And she would hide and I would look out for her in the dark or lighted sections of the room. When neighbours or relations who had overheard my tumultuous cries the previous night asked after me the following morning, Misra, generous and loving, would not speak of the inconveniences I had caused her, nor would she speak of the visitor who had called after midnight. We would look at each other and share a grin or a smile, depending on our respective moods. But neither would talk of our common secret. When nervous, she would rise from where she had been sitting and look away. I would smile to myself triumphantly, knowing that I had her whole life in the power of my mouth and I could do what I wanted with it.
I'll admit that many things are confused in my memory. My head, I feel sometimes, will explode with the intensity of the anecdotes I remember — events which in all likelihood didn’t take place, not, at any rate, as I remember them. One thing which I definitely recall, with the clarity of a daylight occurrence, is how “responsible” Misra felt regarding me, my body and my thoughts. She was responsible for me in the same way as the dweller of a certain place takes upon himself or herself most things that happen in it, so much so that water shortages or power-cuts and similar anomalies are explained away as personal shortcomings. If I had a cold, if my stomach ran or if I spoke unduly rudely to anyone, Misra explained — she justified or interceded for me or she would say that she would take the beating on herself. If taken ill, she would explain why my constitution had weakened or why I wasn’t as healthy and strong as I used to be. But when not in public, she would complain to me directly or grumble or mumble, within my hearing, as though she were talking to herself. “It is in your element to be mean,’ she would accuse me. “Why, you know I am a foreigner here and that if you fall ill, your people will say it is because I haven’t taken good care of your food. You also know that, when you do well, the credit is not mine but your people’s, that is your [Somali] nation whose identity I do not share. Why must you make my life a misery?”
But there are many things of which I am not sure. For instance, Fm not sure who said this: “Your look was smooth — like pebbles in a stream”. Misra herself? Will someone tell me what it means — in concrete terms? Please? Will you tell me? will you explain? You who sit in judgment over me. Will somebody? Yes?