by Sayed Kashua
And once every four years, when the World Cup came around, always during the summer, the TV would stay outdoors for the duration of the tournament and relatives and neighbors would gather round and watch. I loved the World Cup so much when I was little because my father loved it, and I waited for the Olympics, too, because my father waited for them. A pleasant memory of watching together, a feeling of excitement and anticipation, which I reproduced in the life story of a kibbutz member who had fled Argentina after being hounded by the authorities for his membership in a left-wing underground association. All he had told me about was the underground, the flight, and the escape to Israel in 1982. And that was the year of the first World Cup I remembered: my father so wanted Algeria to win, and the Spanish hosts had an anthropomorphized orange as their mascot, and kids collected cards with pictures of the players.
Give me a cigarette.
I passed him one and sat down beside him on the bench.
Polite kid. You don’t smoke next to your father?
No. I just don’t feel like having a cigarette.
Did you know that your grandmother bought me a pack of cigarettes when I was twelve?
No. Why?
Just did. She walked into the house and gave me the cigarettes. You have to start smoking, she commanded. You have to be a man.
Well, once it was …
Ever since I can remember myself she wanted me to be a man, because you need to have a man in the family to defend it, to defend it after your grandfather has been killed. Sometimes I think that she was just telling tales, that there was no war, and that you never had a grandfather and I never had a father. He laughed and exhaled the cigarette smoke, “man.”
Dad.
You say “dad” a lot.
Can I please come home?
Can you?
What’s changed since I left?
You tell me.
Me? I left. How would I know? And yet I know everything, because I’ve imagined Tira every day since, guessing who’s married to whom, who’s built a new house, who’s died early, who’s been born.
Every day I sketched the map anew, walking home from elementary school and from there to middle school and high school. I stood on the roof and looked around, and I saw how the few remaining fields gave way to garages and shops and carpentry workshops. How houses replaced vineyards, storage units instead of guava trees, a Shabbat market where the fig trees once stood. I left but I kept harvesting information, and when there was no information for me to reap, I simply made it up. I didn’t for a second stop searching for the signs that would explain my departure, which was, after all, forced upon me. Or did I force it upon myself? The end of the story with the house was foretold, and I assembled the plot details accordingly. I determined at the outset that there was nowhere to return to, that no matter how much I might want to return, the path would be blocked by coils of barbed wire, guard towers, and military dogs with bared teeth that could tear my flesh.
And I wanted to return and still do, and I know all too well that I have no other place in this world to run to, no alternative shelter in which I can ensconce myself, start a family, and raise kids. I will always be on the lookout for warning signs, everywhere, in every bit of news, clues that fit into the larger picture that I’ve drawn in my mind. Yes, I still am the victim in the stories that I tell myself, and how could I not be?
Look, Dad, it isn’t just Tira, and how could I be like you, full of pride and fighting spirit? Look around, Dad. I’m not making this up. There are no mirages shimmering in front of me. I will never be a warrior, Dad, and I will always be embarrassed by my vulnerability. I wish I could be otherwise, but I’m too cowardly, and I’ve swapped my war for stories. But are they not true stories? What could I have done with no weapon at my disposal? Even if there was, I no longer know in which direction to point its muzzle, and for some reason every time I imagine a battle before sleep, it ends with my rifle pressed up against my temple. I don’t know the identity of the enemy or which flag the allies are flying. The war games that I conjure always end in my death. Yet every night I am prepared to sacrifice myself anew, even though I no longer know for what or for whom. Yes, it’s a shameful surrender. I know. You don’t have to tell me that. How jealous I was of you when you told us that as kids you always knew precisely who your enemies were, that you had no doubt that your dreams would soon be realized. And now, Dad, what do you think now? Can you forgive me for wearing a white flag on my lapel, a flag that I’ve pinned to the sleeves of my children, too, as soon as they were swaddled, at birth, in hospital blankets?
By God, Dad, I’m trying, trying to gather the courage, trying to remember your words, which do not relent and continue to sear like the bark-stripped branches of the lemon tree. And I can no longer find in me the strength, am incapable of convincing myself of struggle for the sake of struggle rather than the outright pursuit of victory. I cannot understand the significance of pride, cannot internalize the meaning of honor, of which you spoke during all those years. Only the power of flight and defeat can I comprehend.
Do you remember all the songs you used to play for us, Dad? Do you remember the music you used to play in the car when we’d go pick za’atar after the rains? Songs that all started with pain, with banishment, suffering, songs that spoke of shackles, handcuffs, prison cells, and confinement chambers? The music was sad at first, sobbing the way only an oud can, and then in the end it would shift and the singers would promise victory and redemption, the release of prisoners, swearing the shackles would melt away. Do you remember, Dad, how at the end of the song the darkness would subside, how they’d promise that the sun would shine, the light would come pouring down, and the wilted flowers would bloom again?
I don’t remember.
How could you not remember?
Remind me.
Where do you want me to start?
From the beginning.
Where does the beginning begin?
I’m thirsty.
We’ll go up to the room, Dad.
You’re saying “dad” a lot.
Tell me something I don’t know.
You want an end to your story?
I want a beginning.
Do you remember the rain that came down that day? The silence of the drive? There was no music in the car, and I did not tell any tale on the way to the bus stop. Only the sound of the rain that I loved so much up until that drive, and all the way I thought of nothing. I was not angry with you for the story that you wrote or the ruin that you brought. I did not think of what they would say in the village and about whether or not a day would come when your wife would forgive you and you would have children and a family. Throughout the drive I was angry because I hated the tapping of the rain. I started to hate the rain that I waited for all year, every year. And do you know what was scary, my beloved son? The scariest thing in the world was that at that moment I longed for your death.
5
At 6:00 a.m., I strode down Kfar Saba’s main street, dragging my little suitcase behind me. It used to take fifteen minutes to walk from the share taxi stand outside the hospital to the row of bus stops along the Ra’anana–Kfar Saba Junction. I didn’t know when the buses started running. My mother was likely making her way to the hospital with one of my brothers. They must have called her; the nurse said they usually make the calls in the morning. The ring of the phone interrupting the rhythm of her heart as she hurried to answer, and they asked if they were speaking with Mrs. the-appropriate-last-name, and she answered that, yes, she was speaking, and maybe she was already crying before she even said yes.
It is not going to rain today. I didn’t need to check the forecast to know. Kfar Saba’s main drag looks just as I remembered from my last walk. I always stopped at red lights at the pedestrian crossings. They were the same—and the streets were still empty at this early hour of the morning.
Wednesday? I think it’s already Wednesday. An ordinary Wednesday. In Illinois, it’s ten at night. The boys a
re surely already asleep, and my daughter is holed up in her room while Palestine is probably reading in bed. I won’t call. There’s no sense in that, and anyway I have no reception. The stores of Kfar Saba are shuttered and boxes of bread and crates of milk are wrapped in plastic and waiting outside of restaurants and cafés.
Soon parents will start waking children for kindergarten and school, preparing the usual sandwiches, giving out the usual orders, spurring them on with the same unchanging script. In the morning my father liked having eggs sunny-side up on black bread. He liked making the meal himself, two eggs, prepared separately, one after another. I liked having my eggs the way my father made them, and it took me some time to perfect his technique so that the yolks kept their shape without leaking and stayed just a little raw, to retain its flavor. Butter is an option but I’ve always preferred olive oil, just a drop. If you practice a lot, the egg can be dropped into the pan with one hand, but I never managed that. I would season only with salt, no black pepper. Some people like it, but I, like my father, preferred not to obscure the taste of the egg. When the white of the egg would start to harden he’d tilt the pan gently and with the spatula would spray the yolk with some of the sizzling oil, in order to sear the membrane.
I wasn’t hungry, even though I hadn’t eaten for a long while. I knew I’d have to have something soon; otherwise I’d pass out. Traffic picked up a bit as I approached Ra’anana Junction. They’ve built a mall there now and a few buildings with the sort of alphabet soup names that seem fitting for high-tech firms. Even the bus stops have been consolidated into a sort of central station. The stops, which were once benches beneath a strip of asbestos roof, had been converted into Plexiglas stops with new seating, but the stops were still arranged in the same order and the bus lines to Jerusalem remained as they were.
The bus was practically empty and on the radio they were running through the same recycled news and the weatherman said there was a chance of rain in the north and center of the country. I sat in the same seat and looked at the empty seat that Palestine had once occupied. I looked at her hair and waited for her to turn around, but she did not look in my direction. I wanted to get to my feet, holding on to the plastic handholds, and tell her simply that I was sorry. I’ll wait for the passenger beside her to get off the bus and then she’ll make some room for me, will scoot over to the window and watch the rain that isn’t coming, and I’ll hold her hand, soft and warm, and I’ll hope that she isn’t yearning for my death, that she isn’t yearning for hers.
And now we have children of our own and I have to get presents for them before returning. Maybe I’ll get them something from the toy store in the airport, and then even if I have no room left in my luggage I’ll be able to take a bag on board, maybe even two, especially if I decide to check the rolling suitcase. I have a ton of time before the flight. I could head up to Jerusalem and come back down. I have the time. My mother is certainly on the way to the hospital and my brothers must already know. I have to buy presents that will make the kids happy, maybe earphones for my daughter, the big, noise-canceling ones, so that she can block out the rest of the world. And for the boys? What could make them the happiest and still be within my price range? It’s Palestine’s money, and with the penalty I was forced to pay in order to reschedule my flights, I’ve already exceeded the limit she set for me. But I have to get them good presents, maybe a remote-control robot for the little guy? And maybe a helicopter for the bigger one? A present that he’ll remember, and in that way my return to the house will be preserved in his memory forever. It’s probably expensive, but I have to, and I’ll stretch the credit card to the max, and if Palestine asks—and surely she won’t ask—I’ll tell her that my father died and I just had to.
What will I buy my wife with her money? Maybe a neck scarf? I looked at the spot where she had once sat on the bus, and I saw the way she lifted her hair with one delicate movement of her hand and watched her loop the scarf around her neck and then let her hair fall back across her shoulders. She’s warmer now and she practically turns around to whisper her thanks.
It’ll be fine, I wanted to tell her, but what will be fine? And how will it be fine? And how can the man who destroyed her home take up the mantel of savior and guarantor of her salvation? Now, too, I remained seated. It was cold back then, and Palestine was without a coat. I’d hoped that she’d be cozy on the bus and was worried that she’d be chilled when we reached the frigid city of Jerusalem. When we get to the central bus station I’ll offer her my jacket, I thought, and maybe that will grant us a moment of intimacy.
Palestine never wears short sleeves. She has a scar along the outside of her left forearm. Once she said tersely that is was the result of a fall from her bike, back when she was in kindergarten. I wanted to think otherwise. Maybe it was the handiwork of her father, her brother, her cousin. I wanted to think that I was her savior. In violation of my father’s orders I returned to Tira, determined to tell the truth and face the results. Palestine is not guilty. That’s all I wanted to say, that I’d never met her, never heard of her, never been on the roof of the elementary school, middle school, or high school, as I’d written in the story. After the phone call from my father, news from Tira started streaming in, news that I ardently sought out, news that informed me that Palestine was real. There was a girl by that name, from a different neighborhood, who’d gone to a different school and who was known by her nationalistic birth name to only a select few people. The story I’d written a year earlier somehow was brought to the gates of the village. My older brother said he’d heard that one of the printing press workers was from Tira and had seen a copy of the journal during printing, while a different family member said that a Jewish journalist had hired a local Arab handyman and had asked him about me and showed him the journal. The handyman recognized the family name and the high school and was shocked that someone would dare to act that way in a school. Or maybe it was just a local man of letters who likes to stay up-to-date on current Hebrew poetry and prose and therefore subscribes to the journal. One way or another, once it was discovered, my story about Palestine was printed hundreds of times and sent to nearly every fax machine in Tira and placed at the doors of the mosques in advance of Friday prayers. Above the actual story, which was printed in full and in Hebrew and credited me as the author, the person who distributed it added, in Arabic: “An Unabashed Act of Harlotry in Tira: How Low Can We Go?” Because otherwise no one would have taken the time to read it.
I learned, from the details I was able to squeeze out of my brother, that the story had become the hot topic in Tira and that my father was fielding dozens of calls a day from people seeking to confirm that what they had heard was true. As far as the residents were concerned, the story was no work of fiction; it was an exposé of a shameful act conducted with the daughter of a respectable, God-fearing family from Tira. Palestine was the main point of interest, not me but rather this rumor of a licentious young woman who thought she could carry out dishonorable deeds without punishment. People in Tira loved hearing of loose girls; it strengthened their faith in the justness of their own ways. The men loved hearing about women who were caught, hoping that the subsequent onslaught and the indelible stain would serve as a warning to their wives and daughters. And the women—who according to my mother did nothing at the mourners’ tents and bridal henna ceremonies besides talk about the publication of the horror story about Palestine and her family—were happy to slaughter a sacrificial lamb so long as it promised to keep the slander at bay and reinforced their sense of their own virtue.
The imams told the story from the pulpits, illustrating the way that immorality gnaws away at the foundations of society, yet another sign of the weakening of faith, a distancing from the morals of the Quran, a trend that must be halted at once. It was, they said, a “plague” that must be treated before it took hold of all of our daughters, tarnishing their honor, their purity, their chastity. My father, so I understood from my brother and mother, was running around
from sheikh to imam, telling them that it hadn’t happened, that it was only a story, and that Palestine was a made-up character that his son had never met and that he never imagined there was actually a girl who answered to that very same name. Palestine, for crying out loud, and is he so dumb, my son, as to reveal this sort of relationship with a woman on the pages of a newspaper? Were it the truth, he easily could have made up any other name; yet he chose Palestine, the homeland, not the woman. Dad conceded that the story was wretched and slanderous and detrimental to the cause of the homeland, and he told members of the local council that he had no idea what I was thinking when I wrote it, especially since he knows me to be a person whose political orientation is focused on the welfare of his own people. This awful story has nothing to do with any young woman from Tira, and he had no desire to tarnish the honor of a respectable local girl who had not sinned.
He also tried to speak with Palestine’s parents, sent friends as mediators, but they returned empty-handed, stating that the parents of the girl had no interest in meeting my father.
And my father said that there’s nothing that can be done, that it has nothing to do with me or the story that I wrote or the truth at large. When people want to believe something, nothing will change their minds, and the people have already decided that Palestine is a whore. And my brother, who was back in the village on college break, said that Palestine was his age and that he hadn’t known that that was her name and that she was a beautiful girl, the prettiest in her class, with a long neck and eyelashes like no one else, just as in the story, and he told me that she had gotten engaged to her beloved before graduating from high school and that all of the girls in class were jealous of her because her fiancé, one of the first accountants in the village, built her the fanciest house in Tira. Not like the ones I remembered from my childhood, not a house on stilts and not a house with a red-tile roof but one of those modern villas that the newly rich villagers had started to build, once they’d hired architects and designers and poured time and money into houses, which would, they hoped, accentuate their wealth. When the story hit Tira, Palestine had been married for over six months, and her husband, who was twenty-eight and the son of a landowning family that sold stores for rent, arranged the most lavish wedding Tira had ever known. Once the story started to make the rounds in the village, Palestine went back to her parents’ house, and one month later she was divorced.
