A Marriage in Four Seasons

by Kathryn Abdul-baki

  The door burst open and a small body with a mass of black curls bounded noisily across the room and into Belinda’s open arms. Joy watched as the mother and daughter held each other a few moments and giggled as if at some hilarious, private joke.

  After hugs and kisses, Belinda slowly straightened up. She wiped her eyes and gently cupped the child’s dainty chin in her palm. Looking into the small ruddy face adoringly, she asked, “My love, Karma, do you know who this nice lady is?”

  The child stared up at her mother a long moment, then nodded shyly and, with no further prompting or any sign of surprise to find her mother and a stranger both in tears, she turned to Joy and flung her arms around her hips. “Mama Joy!”

  Amazed, Joy hugged the child back, caressing her tight curls. She could hardly believe this was happening, that she was actually feeling the live child in her arms. The small warm head, smelling of the heat outside, pressed against her thighs as Joy’s heart raced again; but this time she held the child close in her arms, bending to kiss the top of her head as if she’d always done so. She gulped back a sob.

  When she glanced back up, she saw that, behind Belinda’s tears, was now what seemed to be a grateful radiance, as if she’d just completed a mission, as if this were the way it was meant to be, the way she’d always dreamed it would be.

  Joy felt herself mouth the words “I love you” into the child’s hair. “I love you,” she mouthed again, knowing that she meant these words even more for the courageous woman standing beside her.

  Kairouan

  RICHARD

  28

  They were in a taxi on their way to Kairouan, Tunisia’s holy city.

  It had grown noticeably hotter these past few days, so it seemed absurd to be heading inland, away from the cooling breeze of the sea. Richard was going along with Joy’s wish to visit Kairouan today because it was just two hours away and had two notable mosques she wanted to see.

  It did feel good to get beyond the commercial hubbub of Hammamet and into a more pristine countryside of olive and citrus groves bordered by thick cactuses. Farm women sat on the side of the road in the shade of small swaths of cloth draped over poles, their baskets of fruit for sale next to them. As the taxi passed one of these makeshift stands, the driver pulled up to the vendor and bought several freshly peeled cactus fruits, which he offered Joy and Richard. Although Joy seemed to enjoy the knobby texture of the reddish lumps, Richard found the hard seeds too numerous to spit out and yet uncomfortable to swallow. His jaw was better this morning, but he didn’t want to risk biting down on anything hard.

  “‘Kairouan was founded in 670 AD,’” Joy read from the guidebook. “‘It’s considered so holy that seven trips here equal a pilgrimage to Mecca.’”

  Richard nodded. “I have an odd feeling that I’m on a pilgrimage of my own.”

  These past few days, some kernel had sprouted within him, a recognition that his life was changing for something entirely new. He felt as though he’d previously been submerged under water and was now resurfacing as a vitally different person. He’d never quite felt that way before and was quite exhilarated by this new awareness.

  Although it was only mid-morning, the heat was stifling, and the car’s air-conditioning barely reached the back seat. His feet inside his shoes were hot, and his perspiration was starting to seep through his shirt. “We should have come last week when it was cooler,” he said, rolling down his window.

  “Well, mosques are always breezy,” Joy said, clearly not minding the heat.

  “When you’re sensitive to something—” he began.

  “Honey, you worry about heat like you do traffic. It’s never as bad as you anticipate.”

  He left this alone. Joy always made this correlation with his intolerance of traffic, but despite what she said, the traffic was usually every bit as bad as he predicted. But she was right about his paranoia. He dreaded traffic jams long before he saw them. They just happened not to bother her. She could sit in traffic indefinitely, listening to music, idly thinking of her students’ papers or some article she was writing, impervious to the delays that drove him rabid. He wished some of her blind optimism would rub off on him.

  He closed his eyes, sporadically dozing for the remainder of the warm ride. He dreamed briefly of Joy strolling down a scorching beach with a man who looked oddly familiar. He felt a brief wave of panic.

  It’s what had been puzzling him these past few days—her recent aloofness. Maybe that distance was her way of dealing with all the waiting, but it seemed she suddenly just wanted to be on her own. Just yesterday afternoon, she told him she wanted to go shopping on the street next to the hotel and needed to go alone. She wanted to wander around and not worry about whether he was bored, she had told him. She just wanted to look at stuff and take a few pictures.

  At first, he objected to her going, but she assured him she wasn’t going to the medina, only to the tourist shops nearby. He didn’t particularly want to browse in the shops while she zeroed in on whatever minutiae she found fascinating to photograph, but he did think it odd that she didn’t want him to join her, as if she intentionally wanted to escape him. He wanted to remind her to be careful, but he knew she’d say he was making too much of his sense of the unsettled political atmosphere. He’d spent the afternoon in the room, reading and somewhat worried, relaxing only when she finally came back several hours later looking tired but settled, briefly showing him some of her shots. Nothing more was said of the afternoon, but it still surprised him that she’d wanted some time away from him.

  They arrived in Kairouan shortly past noon and were let off at the town’s historic Great Mosque. The recent change of government had obviously taken a toll on tourism. As in Carthage, except for some schoolboys and their male teacher, he and Joy were the only visitors in the spacious courtyard.

  Although Joy was appropriately draped in the scarf, long sleeves, and long skirt required for women entering Muslim holy sites, the guard at the door emphatically told them they couldn’t enter this sanctuary. Its importance meant it was designated for Muslims only. They could glance in through the open doorways, the guard said, but go no farther.

  “Why didn’t they tell us back at the hotel?” Richard said, fanning himself with the guidebook.

  Joy seemed unperturbed. “Honey, never mind. Come here and see this.”

  He walked to where she was standing and peered in through the massive doors. Rather than the vibrant carpets richly coating the floors of most mosques they had visited, the vast floor of this one was covered by simple straw mats, giving the immense chamber an ambiance of bare, subdued calm.

  Even more unusual, the ancient structure was supported by a virtual forest of tall, mismatched marble columns, some Corinthian, some Roman, and others like the starker Punic ones they’d seen in Carthage.

  “The columns are all different,” he remarked.

  Joy nodded. “They supposedly used looted ones of different pagan eras from all over.”

  He studied the columns’ non-uniformity and felt unexpectedly uplifted. Although the columns’ disunity was evident, the room radiated a profound cohesiveness and harmony, proof that differences could mesh. So why shouldn’t they? The three of them—he, Joy, and the child?

  After they were done looking, they were driven a few minutes away to the smaller mosque of Sidi Sahb, Friend of the Prophet. This mosque was pretty and airy, and light years away in mood and style from the lofty austerity of the first one. Unlike the larger mosque, this shrine to a seventh-century holy man was open to all, and there were already plenty of locals praying or milling about as well as a small group of tourists taking a tour.

  Joy was glancing up at the ornamented ceiling of the main prayer hall. “It’s like being inside a wedding cake.”

  He gazed up at the lacy white plaster molding that resembled edible curls of white frosting, as did so much of the plasterwork of Tunisia’s historic buildings.

  By contrast, the walls of the hallways and
of the outer courtyard were done in colorful flower-motif tiles. As Joy had predicted, the corridors were cool, and they found a bench facing the central courtyard and sat down.

  Despite the bustling worshipers, there was a gentle peacefulness about the place that gripped him. He’d been needing this kind of solace these past few days. For the first time he was beginning to understand Joy’s fascination with temples. It wasn’t the sanctuary, as she’d once explained, but the stillness within oneself that the sanctuary brought about. He reached over and touched her hand, not wanting to disturb her reverie, yet somehow wanting to atone for his own dumb lack of appreciation all these years. It had taken nearly a lifetime for awareness to sink in.

  She glanced at him and smiled, although she soon seemed to be journeying to some other place in her head.

  In the courtyard garden before them, a young mother in a long robe and headscarf was washing a toddler from a spigot in the center fountain used for prayer ablutions. The child seemed at home in the mosque, and his mother didn’t seem concerned when he wandered off to explore the hallways, the safety of unattended children perhaps not such a worry here. Richard pictured Belinda bathing her daughter like that, tenderly rinsing the child’s face.

  He inhaled abruptly. “You realize we’re on the Dark Continent?”

  Joy smiled. “That refers to sub-Saharan Africa, Rich.”

  “It’s still Africa.” He added, “I don’t feel so good today.”

  She turned to him. “Why?”

  He shook his head.

  “Physically?”

  “Everything.”

  “Still that toothache?”

  she asked. “Damn it, honey! Just listen a minute.”

  She stared at him, a ripple of alarm in her eyes at the sharp edge in his voice.

  His snapping at her surprised even him. “I’m sorry. I just wish things could be different between us. I’m so freaking tired.” He looked back at the courtyard where the young mother was now wrapping a diaper around the child, who squirmed on the grass for the changing. “I just want . . . Joy, I just feel you’re hiding something from me.”

  She looked surprised.

  “I do,” he said.

  She half glanced at him as though to avoid any accusation he might be about to hurl at her.

  “Rich, we’ve been making the best of things just like we agreed. What’s wrong?”

  “You. You.” His voice rose in agitation. “Don’t think I don’t see it.”

  The young mother, now holding her child again, glanced over at them, probably wondering what vacationing tourists could have to argue about. He almost envied the man she was married to. She seemed so firmly anchored to her baby, to an accepted reality that seemed to elude Joy, who remained so often buried in her literature and fantasy.

  Then an image of Belinda flashed before him. She was laughing as she embraced her daughter. Their daughter.

  “See what?” Joy said, looking confused.

  He returned to her. “Well, for one thing, what you said the other day on the beach about Gerald Ford, about women wanting excitement but settling for security. You were thinking of me.”

  “No, I wasn’t, Rich. I was generalizing.”

  “You meant us, though.”

  “It was a flippant thing to say. Don’t let it bother you.”

  He patted her knee. “Look. It just makes me think. You must feel you’ve wasted your life with me. I’m not adventurous, not a thrill-seeker. Remember how you used to call me a stick-in-the-mud? Well, maybe I am. You must feel bored out of your mind half the time.”

  She looked at him with an odd expression. “Of course not. Don’t be silly.”

  “I know you always wished I was some other way.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “You’re right about my being uncomfortable taking risks. You could have ended up with—”

  “Richard, you’re wrong. I chose to be with you. And I’m happy we’re back together.”

  “Are you?”

  “I wouldn’t be here if I weren’t happy with you.”

  He exhaled. “Shit! Is it so impossible to understand each other after so many years? I’ve been trying my best to deepen my relationship with you, make it more meaningful—to both of us. What the hell is love, anyway? A commitment to stick it out together year in and year out despite obvious incompatibility? You’re always yearning for adventure, and I automatically seek safety. I know you’re disappointed.” He sighed. “I just don’t know how to fix things between us. I’m sorry.”

  She was looking off to the side now, but he thought he saw her eyes moisten. She touched his arm. “Rich, I have no idea what’s riling you, but please stop. Just think how fortunate we are and how beautiful this place is. I am happy with you, and we are compatible. You are what I need.”

  “What you need? What does that mean, for Christ’s sake?” She looked uneasy. “Honey, whatever you are, it’s what makes me feel good about life, about myself. Why would you even think that I want to be with somebody else?”

  Her words gave him a moment of calm, but the rocky waters surged again. He didn’t know why he was suddenly so confused and afraid.

  “I want to be who you love, Joy. I want to bring out your passion.”

  “You do bring out my passion.”

  “How?”

  “Well,” her eyebrows rose as if to pull invisible answers from the crown of her head, “I like to travel with you, and we enjoy the same foods.”

  He shook his head. “I’m not talking about the damn trips or food. I’m not talking about the pseudo-life of hopping from hotel to hotel. We’re in this for the long haul, Joy. I want to see your eyes light up, and I want you to be drawn to me like you used to be.”

  “I am drawn to you.”

  “I don’t feel it. It just seems like we fuck without feeling much of the time. I can’t reach you. I can’t get past the damn fucking to whoever you really are.”

  “Shh!” she whispered, looking mortified.

  He could see that she was distressed by his sudden mood and by his language in this place of worship. He heaved a sigh. What the hell difference did it make where he said it, but then, where better to be honest than in a place of worship?

  “Well,” she said quickly, as if afraid he might erupt again, “I don’t know, Rich. I didn’t know you felt that way. You’ve changed. I’ve changed. Sometimes we change too much. We lose some of the chemistry, I guess.” She paused, obviously trying to choose her words carefully. “We’ve had a lot to cope with recently. We’re charting a new course. Sometimes that takes time, Rich. But we’re adjusting, and we’re moving forward. Just be patient. Things will work out.”

  She seemed unflappable, that wistful look that was about to give her away only moments ago evaporating. Again, he thought, she was in total damn control.

  “I feel lost,” he said quietly.

  She said nothing, only stared ahead.

  “You might have naturally chosen somebody else if you hadn’t come back to me, Joy,” he pushed on. “Maybe I limit you. Maybe with somebody else you could do more of what you really want. You asked me yourself the other day why we choose the mates we end up with. Well, I can’t help feeling you could have had somebody else, somebody who could give you what you want and not put you through what I have.”

  She stared at him, plainly annoyed. “Rich, why are you so down on yourself today? And what on earth are you suggesting?”

  He sighed. He honestly didn’t know why he felt so crappy; and what, indeed, was he suggesting? That she leave him? Now?

  “I’m just hit with these big questions,” he said.

  She sighed. “Well, there are no big answers, Rich. We just have to live each day and do the best we can. Be grateful and happy for it all.”

  He was starting to get irritated by her stoic tone. She was starting to sound like Belinda, living in the moment rather than securing a future. Maybe it was a female trait. “I am grateful
, Joy, but it doesn’t stop me from questioning.”

  “Rich,” she said, turning to look directly into his eyes, “most things are just a matter of perception and aren’t real unless we make them so. We have enough drama going on at the moment without adding to it. Just decide to be happy and forget the rest.”

  He stared at her. “Well, some things are a matter of perception, but other things are real. I can’t pretend they’re not, Joy. I’m not making things up. You’ve been acting funny, lately.”

  She shook her head. “It’s all in how you choose to see it.”

  He exhaled noisily, practically throwing his hands in the air in exasperation. That was the kind of inscrutable answer that drove him crazy, but the last thing he wanted here, he decided, was a quarrel or even a heart-to-heart—or her telling him to relax or to see a shrink. “It’s the heat,” he said. “Let’s zip through this place, then have lunch so we can get back.”

  “The thing is, Rich . . .” She stopped herself.

  He waited a few seconds. “Yeah?”

  “It’s just something that occurs to me sometimes. About us. About you, mainly.”

  “Tell me.”

  “You seem uncomfortable in your own skin. You seem to feel that the world is out to get you. I never feel that way.”

  He didn’t answer her. It sounded ridiculous, and yet somehow it might just be the most accurate thing she’d said to him. He couldn’t stand feeling disconnected, and he was often not as emotionally self-sufficient as she. And he did tend toward pessimism.

  “And . . .” She hesitated a moment.

  “Yes?”

  “Maybe it’s just not possible to have a partner who fulfills us in all ways. Maybe we should just find happiness where we can instead of obsessing about what’s missing.”

  He could see sadness in her eyes. His heart skipped as he braced himself for what might come next.

  “In a way, Rich . . . we’re all just trying to grow up in life,” she said. “Don’t take things so seriously.”