“You think my job is nothing, that washing dishes isn’t important. Do you think customers want to eat on dirty dishes and lift food with utensils that are stained and sticky? No. I’m as important to this restaurant as those cooks are.”
“Anyone can wash a dish but not everyone can cook.”
Speechless, I cast my eyes down and think he’s right. “Well, I won’t quit.”
“I’m not asking you to quit.”
“You’re firing me?”
He doesn’t reply right away. After a few seconds, he says, “You can get unemployment. I’ll mark your papers that you were laid off.”
“This isn’t right. You know that.”
“The cooks are saying you’re queer," he finally confesses.
“I don’t know anything about that," I mutter.
“Amir," he says, squeezing my shoulder. “You’re a good boy. I don’t care what you do with your personal life. But it’s too bad you can’t find a nice Lebanese girl and settle down. You’re thirty now, right? Well, at your age, I was already married and had two kids. Things would be a lot easier if you’d just…” He pauses.
“What? Find a wife and have children? Marriage isn’t for everyone.”
“For us Lebanese, it’s everything.”
I sigh and push his hand away from me. “Give me my papers.”
“Okay, wait here.”
“You should be careful, Amir," one of the old cooks suddenly says. “Salem can be a dangerous man.”
“But I’m trouble, remember? Isn’t this why I’m losing my job? I make all of you feel uncomfortable.”
“No, no," the man says quietly. “Only Salem feels this way.”
At that point, the boss returns to the kitchen and hands me my paperwork. I don’t thank him just slam the back door wide open against the stucco of the building. I don’t turn around even when the boss calls out my name and says if I need anything to let him know.
The wind is warm as I make my way down the streets of Montreal. It’s only ten in the morning and I’m not sure what to do with myself. For the first time in my adult life, I have nowhere to go. No classes, no job, nothing. I wander through the subway station for a bit, rest on a bench and people-watch. Everyone is rushing. Some wear business suits, others are more casually dressed with knapsacks over their shoulders, coffee cups or newspapers in their hands. They walk with purpose and determination. I sit calmly on the bench with my arms spread out, resting on top and tapping my hands to the tune of a popular French song that plays on the speakers of a coffee shop across from me. When the morning crowd slows down, I get up and buy a drink from that shop, then walk back up the stairs leading outside. I blink my eyes. The morning light is overwhelmingly bright and I look into the distance and see the sunrise change from a mandarin tint to a yellow hue. I stand there for a second until a man bumps into me. Some coffee spills on my shirt and I curse. He doesn’t apologize but keeps going, briefcase in hand swinging at his side. I keep standing there and staring at the sun. It’s so peaceful, I think. After a while, I start walking again. I walk along Sherbrooke Street until I reach McGill. Some students are sitting outside, chatting with each other or reading alone. I find a bench and finish up my coffee, rise to my feet and enter one of the buildings.
I stand in front of a tall lanky man. He looks like he’s in his early twenties. I tell him I’d like some information about some programs. He hands me a few brochures and application forms. I thank him, and return into the morning sun. Heading home, the warm wind pushes me down Sherbrooke Street, past tulips finally opening to spring.
Later that evening, there is knocking at the front entrance. I get out of bed and stumble downstairs, rubbing my sleepy eyes, and answer the door expecting it to be Ben, who always forgets his key. When I open the door, I see Rami. He’s leaning against the doorframe. By his side is a duffel bag, stuffed like a jumbo pillow. He grips the handle tightly. His face is bruised and his lower lip is bleeding. “What happened to you?” I say quickly, reaching out and touching his cheek. He winces and steps back. I help him inside, take the bag from him and notice he is limping while he walks up to my room. I help him to my bed and ease him down onto it. “Don’t move. I’ll be back.” I rush across to the bathroom and fetch a wet facecloth. I clean his wounds as he stares up at the ceiling. His eyes are red but he’s not crying. He doesn’t even move when I clean his lip, which is now swelling; he stays perfectly still. But I look down and see his fingers clenching my bed sheets and it’s obvious to me that he’s in pain.
“What happened to you?” I repeat.
He doesn’t say anything for a while, just keeps staring up at the ceiling. I look up too, to see what he’s focused on, thinking perhaps there’s a spider crawling on it. Then I glance at him again and say gently, “Who hurt you?”
Finally, he lets his gaze fall upon me and clears his throat and says, “My uncle.”
I pace around the room, hands on hips, lips pursed together, my jaw clenching.
Speaking in Arabic, he says, “My uncle told me he got you fired. I’m sorry, Amir.” He pauses and swallows hard. “I’m so sorry," he repeats, his voice faltering.
“Don’t be sorry. It was a blessing in disguise.” I speak in English.
“A bles-sing? Really?”
“Another saying, my habibi," I say kindly. I stroke his bruised cheek. “Your handsome face.” He winces again.
“My uncle kick me out.”
“You can stay here as long as you like. My home is your home even if it’s only a room," I say, laughing softly. Then I remove his clothes and tuck him under the covers. I slide in next to him, put my arms around him and hold him close. I gently caress his face again. “Look at what your uncle did to you.” I sigh and shake my head.
“It okay. Ana okay. Bruise go, habibi," he says, his eyes opening and closing, fighting sleep.
“Sleep," I encourage. A few minutes later, I look down and he’s fast asleep, the moonlight gleaming on his puffy face.
The next morning I wake up and glance at the other side of my bed. Smiling, I trace Rami’s back, making sure he’s real and not a dream. I frown as my eyes fall upon the bruises that have turned a deep purplish-pink. I have a tremendous urge to confront Salem and punch him in the face, hurt him the way he hurt my lover. But I know this is pointless. An eye for an eye doesn’t accomplish anything, only more resentment and pain. Rami doesn’t need this, I think. I jump out of bed, almost forgetting I have another person next to me. Then I slow my pace and creep out of the room, down the staircase, into the kitchen. I scramble some eggs and fry some bacon strips, smiling the whole time. I wonder what my mother and father would think if they knew I had fallen in love with a man. The last time we spoke on the phone they were lecturing me about still being single. “Amir," my mother had started, “you’re almost thirty. You need to find a nice Lebanese girl. Go to church. You’ll find one there. There must be some decent Lebanese girls in Montreal. Find them. Go out. But don’t date long. You should be married in six months, a year at the most. Or better yet, come back home and find a girl here. There are plenty of women who want to move to Canada.”
Then my father had continued, “Yes, your mother is right, Amir. You can find a real nice girl here. Why don’t you come visit us? It’s been too long. You probably wouldn’t even recognize your own brother. Naji’s all grown up now. And he’s dating a nice Lebanese girl. I think they’ll get engaged soon.”
“Before you. Everyone will wonder why he’s engaged before you. Find someone soon. You’re getting old. Soon it’ll be too late," my mother scolded. “What’s wrong with you?” I had held the receiver far from my ear when their words became muddled. Somewhere between “you’re too old” and “date a Lebanese girl” I had drifted off and thought about my hesitation to find a nice woman and get married.
I carry a tray of eggs, bacon and orange juice up the stairs and into my room. Rami is still asleep, the covers half-thrown off his body. He’s naked. Standing at the d
oor, I admire his muscular calves. I feel myself growing hard and I want to make love to him but I don’t want his breakfast to get cold. We have plenty of time for lovemaking, I think. Now it’s time to eat.
I sit across from him on the bed with my legs crossed. Elbows on my thighs, head in my hands, my body leaning in while Rami eats the food I made for him. “I’m sorry I didn’t make an omelette or something more exotic. I’m not a great cook.”
He chews on some food and talks with his mouth full. “Laa, laa, this good. I love scra-m-bled eggs. How you know?” he says slowly.
“Lucky guess.” I smile, then frown when my eyes stare at his bruises. “Does it hurt?”
“A little," he says, scooping up the eggs with a morsel of toast. “I be hann-sum again in few days.”
“I hope so.”
“Why? If I ugly, you don’t love me?” he teases.
Rubbing my chin, I say, “Hmm, I could always throw a bag over your head while we’re in bed.”
He punches my shoulder. “Inta bad!”
I laugh. “Seriously, Rami, kifak?”
“Ana okay," he murmurs.
I clear my throat. “It’s not easy. Our culture can be so closed-minded.”
He switches to Arabic now. “Most cultures are when it comes to people like us. Homos, fags, queers. We’re called so many things. It’s not kind, but sometimes the world isn’t a nice place, Amir.” There is a sadness in his voice, something new, something that wasn’t there before his beating.
I look down at my hands and rub them together. “What will you do now?”
“What do you mean?”
“Will you try to make up with your uncle?”
“I don’t know. I tried, but if he doesn’t want me in his family because I’m gay, then I guess we’re not family after all.”
“I’ll be your family.”
He rests his hand on my knee. Then he asks, “Did you always know you were gay?”
“I guess so. But when Walid raped me, I denied it even more. I thought because I had feelings for boys that was why I was raped. I know this is stupid. But I thought God was punishing me for loving boys. I almost told one of my teachers about the rape but I never did. I kept it all inside. Now when I look back at it, I should’ve told someone. But I didn’t want people to blame me.”
“But it wasn’t your fault, Amir.” Rami leans in and squeezes my knee harder. “You were just a child. That bastard took away your innocence, your confidence. You could’ve become anything you wanted but that man destroyed something in you.”
I stop and stare vacantly out the window. “Do you think it’s too late for me to become a professor?”
“No. You might have to work harder but you can do it.”
“I guess you’re right. Life hasn’t been easy since I moved to Canada. I thought I could accomplish anything here but it didn’t turn out that way. I became a dishwasher.”
“But you’re not one anymore.” He speaks in English again. “You on right track.” He smiles. “See, Amir, I learn new English saying.”
I laugh. “Soon you’ll be correcting my English.”
“Never. Ana bahebbek.”
“I love you too.” I bend towards him and kiss him gently on the mouth. He winces but doesn’t move away, lets me kiss him again, and it’s then that I know I’ve found love.
Twenty-four
AMIR NERVOUSLY TAPS HIS left foot on the tiled floor. He stands in the airport looking out the large windows and wonders if he’s doing the right thing, but when another bomb shakes the earth and the debris from the war-torn buildings rises in a dusty haze, he knows he has to go far away. His own body shakes with the memory of his rape. He closes his eyes, wishes he could erase the assault from his mind forever and heal his broken body. Opening his eyes again, he clutches the railing by the windows and knows there are too many excruciating memories here. He must go. He might even find love in Canada, he thinks. After a while, he turns away from the hazy sky and looks at his family, and a feeling of sadness overwhelms him. Naji walks towards him. The two brothers embrace tightly. Amir knows he will miss him the most. After a few minutes, Amir lets go and wipes the tears from his brother’s face. “You’ll be all right.”
“You too.” Naji chokes back the tears.
Then Amir shakes his father’s hand until his father finally pulls him into his body and gives him a kiss on both cheeks; his stubbly chin tickles Amir’s clean-shaven face. When his father steps back, Amir watches him walk towards the windows, where he grasps the railing and lowers his head. At last, his mother stands across from him. She takes his face in her hands and there is a small smile on her lips and, for one moment, Amir thinks she will encourage him, give him a glimmer of hope because her touches are so gentle, but then she opens her mouth and says, “No matter where you go, you’ll always find trouble. You were trouble from day one, my son. Who’s going to feed you now? Don’t starve.” And with that prediction Amir clenches his teeth and tries not to let it worm its way into his brain. They pull apart and he walks down the terminal, only turning back once to wave one final time. He doesn’t concentrate on his mother, who now sits down with her hands together as if she is praying, but instead keeps his gaze on Naji, his young face tight as he tries to hold back more tears, but they come anyway. He wipes his eyes with his hands then waves again and again. Amir turns and quickens his pace. He suddenly feels lonely walking through the tunnel leading to the plane and he begins to cry as the realization of his departure pounds in his gut. For a few minutes, he lets the fear inside him come out in the weakness that surges in his quavering legs, but then he grasps the handle of his carry-on bag, raises his head and boards the plane. He knows he’s now free.
Twenty-five
WEEKS PASS AND THE bruises on Rami’s face heal nicely. There is a certain freedom since we came out to Rami’s family. I have stopped asking if this is what he wants. I have stopped telling him that we can end our relationship and pretend we never met, pretend that we never skated together, pretend that we never made love. Rami always replied to my concern with a hurt look on his face. “Badi yek," he would say. I want you. Without any reservations, I now watch him as he jumps out of bed, eager to begin his day, and I wonder where he finds the energy. He makes us breakfast and we discuss our lives in our homelands, the possibility of returning for a visit, together as a couple. When we’re finished breakfast, I walk him to his workplace and we enjoy the morning sun on our faces. We don’t talk, just walk side-by-side, our footsteps tapping on the pavement.
After I drop him off at his building, I wander around the downtown core and think about what I’ll do for the day. I enter a coffee shop and buy a latte, then sit at one of the tables and stare at the other customers who hurry in for a java before heading to work or school or wherever they have to go. On the table next to me is a newspaper. I reach across for it, open it and glance at the classifieds. I jot down the numbers of a few places I think might interest me. My eyes ignore the jobs under restaurants, especially the positions for dishwasher. I press my hands together and feel their dryness. A few minutes later, I get up and walk outside, past the bustling crowd. I walk towards the St. Lawrence River and once there, I sit on the edge of the shore and watch the water move; its waves ripple slowly in the warm wind. There is hardly any movement when I gaze at my watery reflection. I am almost tempted to remove my socks and dip my feet, but it’s still a bit cool for this so I sit quietly on the riverbank and listen to the seagulls sing.
When I wake the next morning, I notice Rami has already left for work. I wash quickly then eat some breakfast. I fill out the application form for McGill and, once done, fold it and put it in an envelope. Then I leave my house and head to the university. My stride is fast; I weave past people and run up the large steps of the administration building two at a time. I’m so excited, I have an urge to jump completely naked into the St. Lawrence River but decide not to. This can wait until Rami is around. Two Arab men diving into a river. Two naked
Arab men diving into a river. I laugh. People stare at me but I don’t care. They can gawk all they want, I think. I’m in love.
Rami and I are up early again. Dressed in jeans and light jackets, we are on our way out of the house for a Saturday brunch. But there is a knock at the door. When I pull the door open, Salem’s back is to me. He turns around. “Hello Salem. What can we do for you?” I’m surprised by his presence. We haven’t seen him since he beat up Rami. I glance at Rami, who is now standing beside me. His face whitens. I reach out and squeeze his arm. Salem’s gaze lands on my touch.
“Amir, I’m here for my nephew. It’s time he comes home," he says, averting eye contact.
“What makes you think he wants to go with you? You beat him up. Did you see what you did to his face before you kicked him out of your home?”
“This is a family affair. None of your business. Rami needs to come home.”
“Why? So you can break his bones?”
“Listen, you fucking…” Salem stops. Rami steps forward, hands raised, ready to intervene.
“Fucking what? Faggot? Yes, I’m a fag and so is Rami.”
Salem takes his hands out of his pockets now and rubs them together. I look at them and see that they are shaking uncontrollably. There appears to be a bulge in his right pocket. I go to shut the door but Salem puts his foot between the crack and pushes.
“Not so fast. I’m not leaving without Rami.” He pushes himself inside, twists my arm behind my back and forces me against the wall. Rami tries to pull him away, but he’s too strong and Salem shoves Rami aside instead. Whispering in my ear, he mutters, “I swear I’ll break your arm.”
“Let me go, you bastard," I snap. He twists my arm harder. I scream.
Rami slaps him across the head and Salem stops, lets me go and looks surprised.
The Lebanese Dishwasher Page 13
