by Hasan Namir
Back home that night, we ate in silence at the dinner table. I looked at Mohammed and thought: Really? Are you always there for me? If you knew about me, would you kill me in front of the neighbours, would you mourn if I were killed like Bashar? I realized that my brother wasn’t to blame. I was a coward because I didn’t have the nerve to speak to my brother, to try to explain. I told myself that I should be braver.
After dinner, I went to my room and was reading a book when Mohammed entered without knocking.
“Are you planning to see that girl again?” he asked.
“There is no girl,” I said.
“That’s what I thought.” He paused. What now, I wondered. “I found you a wife.”
“What?”
“I want to make Mama and Baba happy in their graves. They wanted grandchildren. I promised them that.” I didn’t know what to say.
“I know it’s a lot to take in, so I’ll leave you now to think about it.”
A short time later, I heard my brother and sister-in-law whispering. I went to the door to listen.
“Are you sure?” she asked.
“He didn’t say anything, but I assure you he’s going to accept the offer.”
“What if he doesn’t?”
“He doesn’t really have a choice here.” Leaning my forehead against the door, I listened intently.
“Give him some time. I’m sure he will find someone. The boy just needs time.”
“No. Time is running out.”
This moment had come a lot earlier in my life than I’d expected.
Later that night, I left the house after making sure the family was asleep and took a taxi to the club to meet Ali. I don’t know why I was shocked to see two armed police officers standing out front and a sign on the door saying, “Closed, lawat.” As I was about to leave, a hand grabbed my arm and pulled me to the side. It was Ali.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“Not here. Come with me.” Silently, we walked to his car and got in.
“What happened?” I asked again.
“The fucking cops found out about the club and closed it down. Fuck them, fuck this country. I’m so fucking sick of this shit.” He fell silent and we stared at each other, lost and speechless.
“I’m leaving,” Ali said.
“What?”
“I’m leaving Iraq. Bashar was right.”
When Ali saw the tears threatening to fill my eyes, he kissed my forehead, trying to comfort me. But now his touch felt like a stranger’s.
“I can’t live here anymore. It’s not safe for me,” he continued.
“Where are you going?”
“Turkey.”
“You can’t,” I pleaded. “Please don’t leave me here alone.” I felt like a small child about to lose his parents again.
“I’d never leave you here. Never,” he said, surprise in his voice. “You’ll come with me.”
“But … I can’t leave my family. I don’t want to hurt them.”
“Sooner or later, they’ll find out who you are, and they’ll either disown you or kill you …”
“But—”
“We can’t let them slaughter us like animals. We deserve a better life.”
“Yes, but—”
“Go get your stuff. You’re going to stay with me for a few days until we can leave.”
“Tonight?”
“Do you want to come with me or not?”
That night, at home, I sat at my desk, struggling to write a letter to my brother. It took me hours. I had to stop every once in a while and start over. But then I changed my mind and scrapped it entirely. Even through written words, I was afraid of confronting him. Determined, I packed my suitcase quickly. Everything was ready.
I felt like I could trust Ali. I didn’t know how on God’s earth I would get into Turkey without a visa, but I put my full faith in the man I loved and in God. When I knew that Mohammed and Noor were asleep, I left the house quietly with my suitcase. Ali was waiting outside.
Hesitating, I thought of the sorrow that I knew Mohammed and Noor would feel when they awoke and discovered I was gone. I imagined my parents and how they might have felt. Then an image appeared in front of me: my head severed from my body, a sign placed on it with the word “lotee.” That is what they call us. Lotee. I imagined people spitting on me, calling me names, and I imagined sitting across from you, Sheikh, listening to you. I thought about living the rest of my life in an unknown land with a man I truly loved. I felt glued to the spot.
“Ali …”
“Come on, man. Let’s go,” Ali commanded, spurring me to action.
We got into his car. He put on an Amr Diab CD and started to drive away. But then I looked back at the house and thought of my family. My determination was melting away quickly. “Ali, I can’t go with you,” I said.
He stopped the car in the middle of the street.
“Ali, what are you doing?” I asked, but he didn’t say anything. Behind us, angry drivers began to honk their horns.
He didn’t seem particularly upset or surprised. In fact, there was a calm look on his face. Finally, he turned, smiled at me, and said, “I didn’t think you’d be brave enough.”
“Ali …” I reached toward him.
Then, in one fast motion, he pulled a gun from his pocket, aimed it at the side of his head, and pulled the trigger. Blood sprayed everywhere, including on me. In shock, hardly knowing what I was doing, I jumped out of the car and ran away. I left him there as the cars behind Ali’s continued to sound their horns. It was cowardly, Sheikh, but I was terrified and stunned.
Now I wonder if, all along, this is what “Turkey” meant to him. And here I am, a young man stuck inside four walls in my brother’s house. I am to marry a woman whom I have never met. How will she live with a homosexual? Then again, she might never know. We could live our entire lives together and be blessed with children. But I am sure that we would be miserable. Is that the kind of the life I desire? Should I just end it like Ali did? What about my hopes? Could I even allow myself to dream of becoming someone? I struggle every day with my decision to abandon Ali. If I had said yes, would we have been able to find a place that welcomed us? Does Allah even love us? I have read the Qur’an twice already, and it feels like, in Islam, God does not love us. But why, then, did He create us?
I am writing to you for answers. I need your help. Are you willing to help me? You do not know my name; you do not know where I live. To you, I am just a young man who loved another man and realized that he cannot be the person that his family wants him to be. And he needs your help. I need your help. I am writing to you because, even though I have seen you just once, I know you are someone who can help me.
There is only one way that you can tell me that you will help me. I will come and see you again, along with the many men and women who go every Friday to listen to your wise counsel in the mosque. I ask you now to talk about homosexuality next Friday—and condemn it. Please. Condemn it. But if you mention one word, then I’ll know you want to help me. One word. And when you say that word, I will come to you so that you can help me see the light. I need some guidance. I need someone. I do not want to meet the same grotesque end as Bashar and Ali.
One word…
Pink.
Praise be to Allah. I place the letter down and check the clock on my night table: 1:30. In four hours, I have to wake for the morning prayers. Yet I cannot keep my eyes closed for a single minute. Ya Allah. I turn my head and gaze at Shams, my wife, before getting up for a drink of water. Who is this young man? He knows me. But I certainly don’t know him at all. I wonder why he has chosen to write to me, of all people. He didn’t hold back any details in his letter, and that frightens me. Why the colour werdy? Is it metaphorical? I sit at the table and wonder, who is this man? What if he is a friend disguised as someone else? Oh, astaghfirullah—Allah forbids. I don’t want to have to suffer, knowing that a friend is … Allah forbids. Saying the word would bring sin to me an
d my family.
I go to the living room and open the Qur’an and begin to read. Allah forgive me. I cannot concentrate and close the book. The letter writer wants me to speak out about a sinful matter in front of many men and women, even children. God forbid! Back in my room, I return to the Qur’an and try to forget about the letter.
Tick … tock … The clock taunts me. I look around, am overwhelmed with thoughts. I lean over and lightly caress Shams as she sleeps. How would she feel about this? Then again, what is she dreaming of right now? It cannot be of that letter. How can Allah allow me to read such filth? I mean, if I met this man, I would hand him over to our Muslim brothers. Allahu-Akbar.
I grab the letter from the night table and go to the kitchen to fetch a box of matches. But with the match lit and the flame ready, it suddenly goes out in a puff of wind. I turn around and see the face of a small pink creature that I don’t recognize.
“Now, why would you do that?” he asks.
My heart races as I quickly recite a Qur’anic verse. Ya rab ehofthly ebny wa zawjty. Please, God, protect them from any harm.
“Shh, you will wake your wife and son. Is that what you want?”
“No.”
“Then, listen.”
I slump into a chair and stare at the pink creature. He reminds me of a mythical cupid, with two tiny, fluttery butterfly wings. He flies close to the ceiling and smiles down at me. I close my eyes, hoping that I’m in a dream. But when I open them, the creature is still there.
“Who are you? What do you want from me?”
“I don’t believe we’ve met before. You are Ammar—”
“How did you—”
“And I’m the Angel Gabriel.”
I gaze up at him. “Angel Gabriel? I … I don’t believe it.”
Gabriel begins to recite a verse from the Qur’an: “Anyone who opposes Gabriel should know that he has brought down this Qur’an into your heart, in accordance with God’s will, confirming previous scriptures, and providing guidance and good news for the believers.”
I clap my hands, sneering at the same time. “So you can memorize verses from the Qur’an. That’s impressive.”
“Hey, where did your beard go?”
I touch my face and, to my horror, my beard is gone. “What? What did you do with it, you little monster?” How will the faithful at the mosque take me seriously without a beard? What’s worse, the creature now laughs at me like the shaitan laughing at Allah.
“Okay, okay. I’m not a mean angel after all.”
I touch my face again. My beard is back.
“Ammar, I hope this confirms for you who I am.”
“I still don’t believe this. Astaghfirullah.”
“In any case, what were you going to do?”
“I was going to burn a letter. Is something wrong with that? Is it haram?”
“This man is seeking your help, and you turn him down. Is that what God expects from us?”
I remain defiantly silent.
“To be a sheikh isn’t just to lecture and pray and read the Qur’an. You have to help those who are in need.”
I look up at the angel. “But how can I help a homosexual man?” I ask.
The little creature falls silent, looking down in sadness. I realize that I am trapped inside a dream.
“Ammar …”
“Yes, Gabriel.”
“Help this man. He needs you.”
Then suddenly Gabriel is gone and a pink blossom wafts down, as if from the heavens. I catch it before it can land. Holding it in my hands, I marvel at the beauty and perfection of Allah’s work. I put the flower in a glass of water and sit back to admire its hypnotizing effect.
Inhaling deeply, I lay on my bed, but can’t shut my eyes. The walls are closing in. I hold my breath. A force inside me wants to escape my body and scream loud enough that all of Iraq will hear. But who will listen? The sheikh? Mohammed or Noor? Or maybe Ali, whose soul continuously haunts me?
A knock on the door disturbs my thoughts. The door opens, and Mohammed enters with a smile on his face.
“Good morning.” My sense of time is off. I had thought it was dark outside, but he opens my curtains and now I see that the sun is shining.
“Come on, Ramy, get up. I don’t want to be late for class.”
He leaves the room. I stare up at the ceiling where a shimmering light is reflected from the trees outside. I want to hide within them.
Later, I find myself in the passenger seat of Mohammed’s car as he drives. I touch my forehead; it is wet. He looks at me and says, “Are you okay? Why are you sweating?”
“Am I?” I laugh nervously.
He doesn’t pursue it. Instead, he turns on the radio. A song by Fayrouz, the Lebanese diva, is playing; she is known as “Ambassador to the Stars.” Most Arabs listen to her in the morning; her melodic voice has a touch of melancholy.
Mohammed pulls a cigarette from his shirt pocket and lights up. I have the urge to ask for one, but before I can, he turns and offers me the pack. I look at him quizzically, then take one. It’s as if Mohammed is a stranger. Lighting up, I inhale the smoke and let it out in a long sigh.
“I know something is wrong,” he says. “But it’s okay. I don’t expect a response yet. Think about it and come talk to me when you’re ready.”
We don’t speak for the rest of the trip. As I inhale again, I begin to feel calm, rejuvenated. Looking out the window, I see all around us the evidence of war: decaying buildings, fallen bricks, pot-holed streets. I stare in passing at what’s left of the famous University of Baghdad. Oh, the beautiful destruction, the heart-warming death of an historical school. I have looked at pictures in old yearbooks from decades past and wish things had stayed the same. Last week, a bomb exploded near the college, destroying almost everything around it. Just another typical day. The fact that the school still exists is astonishing. It wasn’t so long ago that students were taught by American and British professors, but now our Iraqi brothers pretend to be American and British and want to continue to teach the students in English. Their dream is to be as good as the Americans and the British. But such dreams are hopeless.
Before the war, students were from educated and upper-class families. Now, the University of Baghdad is like any other—it is no longer an elite institution. But Mohammed still takes his job seriously, still tries to maintain his sense of status.
After he parks the car, we part and I walk toward my classroom. Ali’s presence seems to surround me all the time. He breathes when I breathe, he walks when I walk, he talks when I talk. If only I could go back in time; if only I’d made a different decision.
In class, the other students and I sit patiently at our desks, waiting for the professor. The clock ticks as I stare at Ali’s empty seat beside me. I can see his sly smile, feel his arm brush against mine.
“Where is Professor Mahmood?” someone finally asks. I hear the question, but my mind is elsewhere. I am floating on a cloud with Ali, surrounded by blue sky and sunshine. But my so–lace is interrupted by a school official who has entered the room and is standing at the front of the class.
“Students, Professor Mahmood …” He trails off and looks down at the podium. He doesn’t have to tell us more. Professor Mahmood is just another victim. What makes him any different than the rest? One by one, they leave this country. Or worse. I always envied those who could get away.
That evening, I sit quietly at our table eating dinner with Mohammed and Noor, who has made dolmas, stuffed grape leaves with minced meat and rice.
“I got a call from Gamal today,” she says, turning to me. “Do you remember Uncle Gamal, habibi?”
Uncle Gamal is Noor’s older brother. He spent many years partying and living the wild single life. Noor once told me that every time the family brought it up, he refused to settle down. But eventually he married a Kurdish woman he met at work. Soon after marrying, though, they left the country.
“How’s he doing?” I ask.
She
sighs. “Not so good. Still trying.” She falls silent and looks down at her plate. For the rest of the meal, Noor doesn’t say another word. I wonder what has happened to him.
After dinner, Mohammed goes to the living room to watch television. In the kitchen, Noor is wiping the table.
“Here, I’ll help you.” I take over from Noor, who begins washing the dishes.
“So, you didn’t finish your story at dinner,” I say.
She rinses a dish and turns to glance at me. “You mean Gamal?”
“Yes. What happened to him?”
“You know why he left to go overseas, don’t you?”
“No, not really. I just remember he and his wife left very suddenly.”
“Well, they’ve been trying to have a child for some time now—” She falls silent again, sits down on a chair, and continues, “It’s hard, you know.” I can see her eyes are wet. I embrace her.
Bismillah. I’m sitting at the table. I can’t recall whether or not I slept. My body aches. But I try to smile to brighten my son’s morning. Jaffar is ten years old. I’ve followed in the family’s footsteps and rejected institutionalized education for him. Like my father, I believe that the best education is through experience and the Qur’an and the teachings of the Prophet. Jaffar, now a young imam, accompanies me to the mosque every morning and listens to my lecture. When we arrive home, he reads the Qur’an with me; he performs the prayer ritual five times a day with me as well. One day, I hope that he will become a sheikh like me. I see in him a younger version of myself, wearing the white dishdasha and cap on his head. Of course, Jaffar doesn’t yet have facial hair, but he will. Masha’Allah.
He finishes eating his pache, his favourite dish. My plate is still full. I prefer chicken, but I enjoy seeing Jaffar’s face when he eats this meal, his eyes aglow. He looks up and says, “Should we go now, Baba?” I consult my watch and answer, “Not yet, we still have time, man.” I like to call my son “man” because I want him to think he is one, even though he is still young. When I look at him, I see the grown man that he will become.
