She stands by the window, with her back to her man. “You must remember. Because you kicked me out of bed that night too. I spent it in the kitchen.” She sits at the foot of the curtains patterned with migrating birds. “Another night, I dreamt of the boy again… This time, he was asking me to bring him my father’s peacock feather… but…” Someone knocks at the door. The woman emerges from her dreams, from her secrets, to lift up the curtain. It’s the young boy again. “No, not today!” the woman says firmly. “I am…” The boy interrupts her with his jerky words: “I… m-m-mended th-the d-d-door.” The woman’s body relaxes. “Oh, so it was you! Thank you.” The boy is waiting for her to invite him in. She doesn’t say anything. “C-c-can… c-c-can I…” “I told you, not today…” the woman says wearily. The boy comes closer. “N-n-not… n-n-not to…” The woman shakes her head and adds, “I’m waiting for someone else…” The boy takes another step closer. “I… I d-d-don’t w-w-want…” The woman cuts him off, impatient: “You’re a sweet boy, but I’ve got to work, you know…” The boy tries hard to speak quickly, but his stammer just gets worse: “N-n-not… n-n-not… w-w-wo… rk!” He gives up. Moves away to sit at the foot of a wall, sulking like a hurt young child. Helpless, the woman leaves the room so that she can speak to him from the doorway at the end of the passage. “Listen! Come this afternoon, or tomorrow… but not now…” Calmer now, the boy tries again: “I… want t-t-to… s-s-speak… t-t-to you…” In the end, the woman gives in.
They go inside and ensconce themselves in one of the rooms.
Their whispers are the only voices echoing through and underlining the gloomy atmosphere engulfing the house, the garden, the street, and even the city…
At a certain point, the whispering stops and a long silence ensues. Then suddenly, the violent slamming of a door. And the boy’s sobs departing down the passage, across the courtyard, and finally fading into the street. Then the woman’s furious footsteps as she marches into the room yelling, “Son of a bitch! Bastard!” She stomps around the room several times before sitting down. Very pale. “To think that son of a bitch dared spit in my face when I told him I was a whore!” she continues with rage. She stands up. Voice and body stiff with contempt. Walks toward the green curtain. “You know that guy who came here the other day with that poor boy, and called me every name under the sun? Well, guess what he does himself?” She kneels down in front of the curtain. “He keeps that poor little boy for his own pleasure! He kidnapped him when he was still a small child. An orphan, left to cope on his own on the streets. Kidnapped him and put a Kalashnikov in his hands, and bells on his feet in the evenings. He makes him dance. Son of a bitch!” She withdraws to the foot of the wall. Takes a few deep breaths of this air heavy with the smell of gunpowder and smoke. “The boy’s body is black and blue! He has burn scars all over-on his thighs, his buttocks… It’s an outrage! That guy burns him with the barrel of his gun!” Her tears tumble onto her cheeks, flow down the lines that surround her lips when she cries, and stream over her chin, down her neck and onto her chest, the source of her howls. “The wretches! The scoundrels!”
She leaves.
Without saying anything.
Without looking at anything.
Without touching anything.
She doesn’t come back until the next day.
Nothing new.
The man-her man-is still breathing.
She refreshes the drip.
Administers the eyedrops: one, two; one, two.
And that’s all.
She sits down cross-legged on the mattress. Takes a piece of fabric, two small blouses, and a sewing kit out of a plastic bag. Rummages in the kit for a pair of scissors. Cuts up bits of fabric to patch the blouses.
From time to time, she glances surreptitiously at the green curtain, but more often her eyes turn anxiously toward the curtains with the pattern of migrating birds, which have been pulled open a crack to make the courtyard visible. The slightest noise draws her attention. She looks up to check whether or not someone is arriving.
And no, nobody comes.
As every day at noon, the mullah makes the call to prayer. Today, he preaches the revelation: “Recite in the name of your Lord who created, created man from clots of blood. Recite! Your Lord is the Most Bountiful One, who by the pen taught man what he did not know. My brothers, these are the first verses of the Koran, the first revelation given to the Prophet by the angel Gabriel…” The woman pauses and listens carefully to the rest: “… at the time Allah’s messenger withdrew to meditate and pray in the cave of Learning, deep in the mountain of Light, our Prophet was unable to read or to write. But with the aid of these verses, he learned! Our Lord has this to say about his messenger: He has revealed to you the Book with the Truth, confirming the scriptures which preceded it; for He has already revealed the Torah and the Gospel for the guidance of mankind…” The woman goes back to her sewing. The mullah continues: “Muhammad is no more than an apostle; other apostles have passed away before him…” Once again, the woman stops her patching and concentrates on the words of the Koran: “Muhammad, our prophet, says this, I have not the power to acquire benefits or to avert evil from myself, except by the will of God. Had I possessed knowledge of what is hidden, I would have availed myself of much that is good and no harm would have touched me…” The woman doesn’t hear the rest. Her gaze wanders among the folds of the blouses. After a long moment, she lifts her head and says dreamily, “I have heard those words before, from your father. He always used to recite that passage to me, it amused him hugely. His eyes would shine with mischief. His beard would tremble. And his voice would flood that sweaty little room. He would tell me this: One day, after meditating, Muhammad, peace be upon him, leaves the mountain and goes to his wife Khadija to tell her, ‘Khadija, I am about to lose my mind.’ ‘But why?’ his wife asks. And he replies, ‘Because I observe in myself the symptoms of the insane. When I walk down the street I hear voices emanating from every stone, every wall. And during the night, a massive being appears to me. He is tall. So tall. He stands on the ground but his head touches the sky. I do not know him. And each time, he comes toward me as if to grab me.’ Khadija comforts him, and asks him to tell her the next time the being appears. One day, in the house with Khadija, Muhammad cries, ‘Khadija, the being has appeared. I can see him!’ Khadija comes to him, sits down, clasps him to her breast and asks, ‘Do you see him now?’ Muhammad says, ‘Yes, I see him still.’ So Khadija uncovers her head and her hair and asks again, ‘Do you see him now?’ Muhammad replies, ‘No, Khadija, I don’t see him anymore.’ And his wife tells him, ‘Be happy, Muhammad, this is not a giant djinn, a diw, it’s an angel. If it was a diw, it would not have shown the slightest respect for my hair and so would not have disappeared.’ And to this, your father added that the story revealed Khadija’s mission: to show Muhammad the meaning of his prophecy, to disenchant him, tear him from the illusion of devilish ghosts and shams… She herself should have been the messenger, the Prophet.”
She stops and sinks into a long, thoughtful silence, slowly resuming her patching of the little blouses.