by Fadia Faqir
He picked up a cigar, tapped it on the dark table and said, on will just collect and wash glasses between seven and eleven-thirty on Friday, Saturday, and possibly Thursday nights.'
`Thank you. Thank you very, very much,' I said and stood up, ready to rush out of the door before he changed his mind.
`Wear something decent,' he said, `a white shirt and a black skirt.'
`No problem,' I said.
`I will see you on Friday,' he said and then lit the cigar.
When I walked out of the hotel my burning face was hit by a gentle cold breeze. She was out there whimpering, crying, looking for a foothold. I knew that wind. A sudden chill ran through me so I bent forward as if winded and hugged my erect nipples. The muscles where my ribs meet between my breasts were inflated then collapsed as if I had sunk inwards. Before I had the chance to look at her face she was taken away by the warden to one of the homes for illegitimate children. I lay on the floor bleeding like a lamb slaughtered for the grand Eid festival. Noura, Madam Lamaa, Naima and others held me down and poured cold water over my head to force me to breathe. They began praying and washing my body. `May Allah have mercy on Salma! Alleviate her distress, God, lighten her load, widen her chest! Bless her with the gift of forgetfulness!' they chanted together. They rubbed my hair, my shoulders, my arms, my back, my legs with soap until I was covered with white lather. `Damn your prayers, she is still not breathing' When I was two breaths away from death, I heard a shot in the distance. Another girl, who had been released by the prison authorities, was shot dead by her young brother. I opened my mouth and inhaled, straining my lungs.
I went to Gwen's straight away and knocked on her door. I could hear the shuffling of her feet on the floor. `Who is it?' she asked.
`It's me, Salina, open the door.'
She slid the chain open and said, `Oh! Hello, Salma!'
I held her tight and waltzed her through the dark corridor.
`What's happened to you?' she asked.
`Oh sorry, Gwen, I forgot about your arthritis. I got a part-time job at the Royal.'
`Doing what exactly?' she said.
`Collecting and washing empty glasses.'
`That's all right as long as it remains that way,' she said and put the kettle on.
`Gwen, I want to have a holiday, I want to go to Greece and have a look across the Mediterranean.'
`I thought you gave up on that dream a long time ago,' she said and sat down. On the kitchen table there were an open can of baked beans, two slices of toasted bread and a cup of tea.
`I must have interrupted your dinner. I am sorry.'
`It's all right, I never heat up the beans. Make yourself a cuppa, will you?'
I made myself a cup of tea and sat down. `You know English people. Dos and don'ts, please.'
`You must wear decent clothes, but try to look classy, never wear tight short skirts, don't talk to customers and be as unobtrusive as possible. Don't tell Max. And I hope to God that you will not break any glasses on your first day.'
An old album full of black-and-white photos was open on the table.
`Have a look!' she said.
I turned the album round and looked at snaps of Gwen's memories. Pointing at a fading photo of a wellkempt man she said,'My father. He was a great man.'A tall and thin man with intelligent eyes stood by an aeroplane.
I drank up my tea, kissed her on the cheek and rushed out.
When I got out of Gwen's house I saw Elizabeth walking stealthily across the street to the off-licence as if she were being followed.
`Hello, Liz,' I shouted.
`You have been to Gwen's?' she said.
`Yes?' I answered.
`The riff-raff stick together,' she said and almost stumbled trying to get up the pavement.
It was seven o'clock and Liz was already drunk. She staggered into the shop and through the glass I could see that she was welcomed by Sadiq's dextrous smile.
After a sleepless night in the port detention centre I was ushered out again to an office full of flickering screens and bleeping machinery. The immigration officer behind the desk looked so white and tired. His eyes were swollen and red; his starched collar dirty and his oily hair stuck to his head. He kept his hands clasped together and his back straight while observing me trying to sit up after the cold sleepless night.
`Salma, why have you come to Britain?'
I did not understand `have you come'. So I nodded.
`Are you seeking political asylum?'
I tried to remember what Miss Asher had instructed me to say. All the trivial `good morning's and `enjoy your meal' were readily available, but I could not recall the exact word she had asked me to use. `Adapted," I finally said.
`Adopted?' he said while flicking through reams of paper.
`Yes.Yes. Adopted, Miss Asher.'
Looking at the blue lights reflected on the barred window, Noura said that it all started in a small kebab shop where she used to watch the dying lights of the capital while washing dishes all night long. The owner ordered her to use kerosene and lemon to get rid of the fat clinging to the utensils. Enveloped in a cloud of kerosene and lemon she used to spend her nights watching snatches of sky between the old dusty houses.When the first thread of light brightened the sky, she would fold her apron and wash her hands ready to go home. She must go back quickly to take Rima and Rami to school. There were no buses at that time of the morning so she had to run the three miles back to her house.
Dear Noura,
Seventeen years ago, we met in prison. You were charged with prostitution and I was accused of having sex out of wedlock. Do you remember me? You went on hunger strike and were force fed. You smiled when I stopped mine. You also gave me your mother-of-pearl combs and a bottle of perfume. I still have them. I put them together with her lock of hair and my mother's letter in a small Chinese silk box. Your daughter must be twenty four by now and your son twenty-six. My Layla is sixteen. In two years' time she will start university. She decided to do medicine and I said why not? I hope, Noura, that life is being kind to you after all these years and that your children are taking good care of you so you do not have to hustle any more. One of these days we shall meet.
Love, Salma
I licked the envelope with my tongue, sealed it then wrote the only address I had for Noura: the old country. Before having my dinner, I walked to the post box and posted the letter. When the blue aerogramme air-mail envelope was swallowed by the gaping red mouth of the post box my hands stopped shaking. I could go and have my dinner now
In the early evening the cottage was cold and dark. I went to my bedroom and switched on the television. London's EastEnders were at it again, having fights with their parents, wives, friends, sleeping with their sisters' husbands and then making up as if nothing had happened. The evening spread itself long and thin to the end of the horizon, where I could see cows sleeping in the open meadows. The days were getting longer so a dark blue glow never left the sky, lighting up its edges with a dying flame. While eating my dinner, pasta with a tomato and garlic sauce, I watched TV. It was a holiday programme about a Greek island. Will I ever set my eyes on hidden Greece? I got really excited thinking about taking the plane for the first time in my life. `I am flying to Spain on Sunday' was what Max said once a year when he was about to take his family to Ibiza. I would do my evening job properly. I would wear my classiest dress, keep my mouth shut, put little make-up on, tie my frizzy hair tight, and if I spoke I would speak slowly and carefully in order to sound as English as possible. I would say, `Have you finished with this, sir? Thank you very, very much, sir.'
I told Max about Parvin's job interview so he agreed to give me the afternoon off. She had applied for tens of jobs without any luck. I said to her maybe she needed to smarten up and I opened the large plastic bag. `A suit for you! Max gave me some leftover material and I make for you. Took your size from dirty clothes.'
She was reading the newspaper so she blew up at her fringe, looked up at me then down at the paper.
Her hair was dull, her skin dry, her nails without varnish, her back bent.
`I took time off for your interview Please, Parvin, let me come with you this afternoon.'
She finally stopped reading and said, `I need to get ready.'
`Me help'
She went out to have a shower in the communal bathroom and I plugged in the cassette recorder and pressed `play'. Music filled the room. The band sang of watching over each other and broken promises.
She came back to the room in her pyjamas, her hair wrapped up in a towel. I sat her down and unzipped her pink make-up bag and put it on the bed next to her. She got a cream jar out, put it back in, then got it out again and began rubbing cream on her face. I made her a cup of coffee and began tidying up the room.
She looked at me and said, `This song is before Sting had left Police.'
`Left the police force,' I said.
`No, Police the band,' she said and smiled.
The London train punctuated my life whenever it passed through the valley reminding me of what lay ahead at the end of the line. It was a spacious railway station with a stall selling flowers and a small cafe.When feeling tired I would go to the station and sit still in the cafe listening to the sounds of arrivals and departures. A black man was mopping the dull floor rhythmically then plunging the mop in the bucket full of water and bleach. The sound of loudspeakers telling us what to do and where to go was soothing. I would sip my tea and listen to the flapping of pigeons' wings caught up in the mesh lining the roof, the hellos and bye-byes of passengers, the guard's whistle and the shunting of trains. In the station, where passengers, families and friends were waiting, I felt at home. The post box in the far corner was the beginning of a thread connecting me to my loved ones overseas. The noise of the crowd, shunting and the whistles managed to frighten off the ghosts that stalked me. In transit or public spaces like receptions, lobbies or waiting rooms I felt happy, suspended between now and tomorrow.
When I heard the whiz of the bullet speeding towards the head of one of the released inmates and her heartwrenching cry, `Oh! Ya Allah!' I decided to stop seeking death. I dried my face and said to the dirty walls, `Layla, I will call her Layla.' I took my reed pipe out of the bundle and began playing a reaping season tune. Salina, with tender hands and feet, gave birth to Layla, on a mild and luminous night. From then on I did not speak or have a whiff of sleep. I would just sit in the dark prison room, leaning on the wall and watching the sky through the high barred window If it had some sheen on it I knew that it was the fifteenth of the Arab month, when women turn into ghouls and eat travellers; when my period began and I would start looking for clean pieces of cloth. I remained curled up in the dark until the inmates forgot that I was there wide awake and sore. One night I overheard Noura saying to Madam Lamaa, `Do you think she will ever forgive me?'
`Your intentions were good,' Madam Lamaa said.
`But both options were as bitter as colocynth.'
`She will get used to the taste,' Madam Lamaa said.
`I thought if the lips of her baby touched her nipples she would never be able to forget her. If she suckled her for a year she might not have been able to let her go,' said Noura.
`But she would have enjoyed nursing her baby for a while,' said Madam Lamaa.
`May Allah forgive me, I paid Naima to take her away instantly.,
I stood up and hurled myself at Noura.
`What seems to be the problem?' said the plastic surgeon. After I moved in with Liz I went to the doctor to get an appointment with a specialist. It took five months to get the appointment and all that waiting tied up my tongue. He pulled his silver pen out of the pocket of his white coat and twisted it open. `What is your name?'
'Salma El-Musa,' I said.
He switched on the desk lamp and said, `What can I do for you?'
I hugged my breasts.
`Do you want a breast reduction?' he said.
Whenever I was under pressure my English would recede. `No, nibbles reduction,' I said.
`You mean nipple reduction,' he said and waved to the nurse to stand beside him. `Let me have a look!'
I unbuttoned my shirt, but kept it on, unhooked my bra, pulled the straps through the sleeve of the shirt until the bra was released. My nipples stood dark, erect and long in the middle of a circle of long black tufts of hair.
He pointed the lamp at my breasts and touched my nipples with his cold finger then measured them. He looked at the nurse and then looked at me and said,'There is nothing wrong with your nipples. One and a half centimetres is longer than average, but they seem normal to me.'
`I want them reduced, cut out, doctor, please,' I said in a trembling voice.
`Why?' he asked pointing the lamp at my face.
`You cannot see other women's nibbles. Me always dark and out. Slice them. Better that way,' I said with eyes brimming with tears.
Speaking to the nurse, he said, `I want her referred immediately for psychiatric treatment,' and switched off the lamp.
I buttoned up my shirt before hooking my bra and pulling the straps into place. When I looked up the nurse and the doctor were looking at me intently.
`Me no mad,' I said while trying to manipulate my bra up to cover my breasts.
The next day I did everything Max had passed on to me quickly and quietly to save my energy for the next job. It was difficult because Max was in a talkative mood. He was full of praise for an old Rolls-Royce he saw in the parking place. `Oh! Our fathers and forefathers were more skilful. If you look inside that car you won't be able to see a trace of a stitch and there is a box for the cloth and shoe brushes all neatly tucked under a panel. Oh! We used to be lords and masters. Just look at us now Look at us.'
`You used to rule the world,' I said imitating Parvin.
`Yes, the sun never set on the British Empire,' he said, pinning the hem of some trousers at the correct length.
`Parvin said you ruled over palm, pine and coconut,' I said.
`Yes, coconuts like you," he said and sniggered.
`I no coconut," I said.
`We rule over ivy-ridden buildings and white elephants now.
In Minister Mahoney's company I never felt foreign. I remembered him with his small glasses, wide smile, his funny tales and limitless compassion. Although he was a man of religion he was so kind and understanding. He said that I looked like a frightened puppy that morning and I smiled.
`Dark puppy,' I said.
`Yes, there are some dark puppies around' He held my cold hand and said, `Don't you worry. We will get you out of this detention centre soon. 'I pulled my hand away and thanked him. Later on I learnt that Miss Asher, the Little Sisters and Minister Mahoney the Quaker took the British government to court on my behalf. My adoption papers were in order but the immigration authorities questioned their authenticity. Miss Asher told me that Minister Mahoney argued my case beautifully and gave me the script of his speech. I looked up the words in the Oxford English-Arabic Dictionary and read them and reread them until they began to make sense. `Even if you want to question the adoption, which is ridiculous in itself, she should be given the right of political, social or religious asylum - whatever you want to call it. Yes, you would create a precedent, but hundreds, nay thousands of women are killed every year.You must give her shelter because if you send her back she will be shot on sight.'
I rushed to the public toilets and changed into a long black skirt, a white frilled shirt and flat shoes. I tied my hair and coiled it into a bun, then put on some light makeup. I looked like my old self, the shepherdess from Hima. The only difference was the wrinkles, as if a cock had stamped on my face on its way to its cage leaving a web of lines behind. I treated myself to a cheeseburger and a large Coke, thought about the evening job, psyched myself up, as Parvin would say, and walked to the hotel. I gathered some courage and opened the old heavy door. The receptionist gave me one of her mechanical smiles and said, `You need to see Mr Wright, the bar manager.' I nodded. `Next time use the side d
oor to the bar.' She opened a door to an old dusty office, full of wine boxes, plastic glasses, mats, and there in the middle of it all sat Mr Wright, oiled and groomed, wearing a spotless black suit and a bowtie. He was speaking on the phone like the old aristocrat in the television ad who ordered Persian carpets to be flown in from the end of the earth. Mr Wright looked like an old gentleman's butler but behaved as if he were not in service. He put the receiver down and looked at me, standing in the middle of the small office and gripping the handles of my cheap black bag. His grey eyes shot an arrow of disapproval at me.
`Good evening, Salina" he said slowly, careful not to mispronounce my name.
`Good evening, Mr Wright,' I said.
`Call me Allan, please' With both hands he pressed his gelled hair into place, rubbed his nose and said, `You are early today. Go and dust the glasses and bottles in the bar. I will pay you cash, three pounds an hour.'
`Thank you,' I said and almost stumbled out.
A sea of bottles and glasses extended in front of me. I put on the rubber gloves he gave me and began wiping the glasses. `Don't wear them when you collect the glasses, just behind the counter please,' he said. Half an hour later, the customers started arriving. Mr Wright and someone called Barry were serving behind the bar and I continued dusting and polishing. Men in grey suits, salmon-pink shirts, striped ties and tired faces drank bitter and smiled. They sucked their cigars, filling the small space with the smell of tobacco. In a cloud of smoke, and among the clink and clank of glasses and chatter, I became invisible to the customers. They would see a thin dark hand taking away the empty glasses to create more space on the table for their hands and elbows.
`It is raining cats and dogs,' I said to Minister Mahoney one morning. He was sitting by the fireplace. The house in Branscombe he had inherited from his mother was old and spacious, with a `Victorian fireplace, with poppy and swallow tiled insert. She was so fond of this fireplace.' He took off his raincoat and his walking shoes and stretched his thin legs towards the flames. `You insist on leaving,' he said, rubbing his hands and looking at the embers. `I bought you a return ticket to Exeter as promised,' he said. He gave me seventy pounds pocket money, the Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary of Current English and the address of a cheap hostel run by the local authorities. `I wrote to them so they are expecting you,' he said without looking up.'The return ticket so you can come back if you are ever in trouble.'
