Ibrahim ibn Musa. His face drew up in a grimace of pain and anger at the nature of their existence, but his eyes, black as theirs, swam tears across this vision of his people.
Chapter 19
Julie Summers. In the human press of the airport, in the eyes of the man made out with difficulty in his cave of a shop, in the faces turned in curiosity to study her, close by in the bus, it came to her that she was somehow as strange to herself as she was to them: she was what they saw. That girl, that woman had lived all her life in the eyes of black people, where she comes from, but never had had from them this kind of consciousness of self: so that was what home was. She was aware of this with an intrigued detachment. And it meant that when she went forward to his family in this state, with him, the son who belonged to them, she could do so offering herself in an emotional knowledge: if she was strangely new to them, she was also strangely new to herself.
There they were. At the bus terminus, men of the family; they could not have known the exact time of arrival but they were there. The photographs that might have been — he wasn’t sure — among the things he had kept at the garage and that she had never been shown — here they were brought to life. The formal group of men made them recognizable, distinguished from the anonymity of the distracting crowd; apart, they belonged to him, Abdu-Ibrahim, the wave of their joyousness broke over the couple. The elderly men among them, thick-creased faces, but no uncertainty about which was the father, there was a moment of stillness in that face— the moment of unbelief at a longed-for materialization offering itself in the flesh — that made the man unmistakable despite no physical resemblance between father and son. The embraces were long. The rush and chatter of people in the terminus an accompanying chorus; she was caught up in the emotion of these men, did not know if she was part of them or of the chorus. It was as if she had lost sight of Ibrahim. He was presenting her to his father. The man made a speech of welcome, drawn back from the two of them, she felt his attention, he was addressing her, and she opened herself to it while the son, her husband, gave nervous pressures of some sort of impatience or disapproval on her arm as he translated. Speak English, speak English. — The interruption was not heeded. — He can speak a little. At least to greet you.
She jerked her arm against the restraining hand, in dismissal; the hoarse flow and guttural hum of the language reached her on a wave-length of meaning other than verbal. The second elderly man, arms stoutly crossed in confidence over his chest, smiling down upon the ceremonial from some vantage of his own, was introduced to her — the Uncle. The names of the others could not all at once match the individual brothers she knew of, and there were cousins to be confused with them, as well. Some wore casual Western clothes, others were in the traditional long white tunics that, for her, gave them undefined stature, the whole party made the path of their event out of the terminus and to four cars in which, arguing theatrically about who should go where, they found room for themselves. She sat at the passenger door, sharing the front seat with her husband who was close up beside the Uncle in his, the best car. The others accompanied them in a horn-blowing procession to their destination: the place, the street, the house where Ibrahim ibn Musa came from to the garage round the block from the EL-AY Café.
In a street, people were outside a house, smiling and stirring when the procession drew up blaring, the Uncle’s car in the lead, the other, road-worn ones coming to a stop with shudders and jerks of their battered chassis. More neighbouring male relatives to be introduced, and among them the children of the house. The children stared at the woman Ibrahim brought, giggled, ran away when she laughed and held her arms wide to receive them. The house — its face, facade — she could be aware of only peripherally behind the excited assembly, the carrying of the elegant suitcase, canvas bag and bundles snatched by various hands taking charge. A flat concrete roof with some clutter of living visible up there; women were peering down from behind its wall, eyes eager and smiling.
She passed an empty pedestal flower-urn painted blue, a burglar grille ajar at the door.
Struck from the sunlight outside, centred in blinding dimness was the still darker shape of a solid figure seated on a sofa; the presence of this house.
She was produced before his mother by her husband. The welcome was formal; as her eyes grew accustomed to the change from the sun’s intensity, the hushed room emerged, other women there. The presence — this woman with a beautiful face (she knew it was his mother he would look like) asserted beneath a palimpsest of dark fatigue and grooves of unimaginable experience, addressed her majestically, at length and in their language, but her gaze was on her son and tears ran, ignored by her, down the calm of her cheeks. He translated abruptly, probably omitting elaboration, and then his mother engulfed him, the flight of sisters set upon him, upon the woman he had brought as his wife. And at once her impression of his parents’ house, his home, into which she had now truly been received was broken up by activities that spilled through doorways where people pushed past one another, balancing dishes of food wreathed in steam and sharp-sweet scents. The women were a swirl of their enveloping garments, polyester chiffon and braid, bobbing and dodging; the men were conducting, giving orders. People sat round small tables on the carpet and cushions and ate — the way Ibrahim had given up, in the company of The Table — agilely with their fingers. Not all the dishes could be found room for on the flowered cloths among glass plates and brightly-coloured glasses. There were bowls of fruit and sweetmeats on the television set; small children ate with concentration between the adults’ feet and older ones raced in and out the front door helping themselves on the run. Ibrahim the bridegroom was at his father’s side, Julie the bride was facing him across others, with his mother. She touched now and then at the pin that held her skimpy garment closed at her throat; the breathing of the powerful presence at her side stirred robes rising and falling, ample. The food was delicious; when she had had her fill of couscous and vegetable stew the women brought in mutton chops, salad, and handed round the honeyed sweetmeats; she at least knew enough to observe the etiquette that here it was impolite to refuse anything offered; the strength of the coffee helped, long part of therapy after other kinds of indulgence, left behind. Sweet synthetic drinks took the place of wine; to signal her closeness she had lifted her glass to him, down there among the men, calling for his rare and beautiful smile — but it did not come, his glance met her a moment but he was apparently answering questions from his father and brothers. It was the Uncle who made him smile, booming laughter through a full mouth as he told what must have been a joke or made a salacious remark — this was, after all, a kind of wedding feast as well as a son’s home-coming. One of the sisters shyly spoke English when urged by the women, in their own language, to come up to Ibrahim’s bride. There was a phrase-book exchange so that the foreign newcomer to the family might not feel left out — the men were confidently animated among themselves, round the returned son, the women preoccupied with the replenishment of food, chattering softly as they moved swiftly about.