The Girl with Braided Hair

by Rasha Adly

  As she brushed her teeth before bed, she noticed under the harsh light of the bathroom mirror that several white strands had crept into her hair. She knew that these signs of age could be concealed: her hair could be dyed and her wrinkles would disappear completely with a shot of Botox. But this was not the issue; it was that time flashed by like lightning.

  She brushed harder and harder at her teeth, wondering: how had her mother occupied her time?

  She would have cleaned up the breakfast dishes, of course; gone to market to buy groceries for dinner and pick up the things everyone in the house needed. Yasmine couldn’t remember a time when the house had not been full of anything one could possibly have an appetite for, and she had never needed a pen or notebook and not found one in her desk drawer. Her clothes were neatly hung up in her closet with care; often, she had found new dresses, socks, and hair ribbons in there. With all this, her mother had taken care with her appearance, always attractively and smartly dressed. She had had a few friends whom she made a habit of meeting at the sporting club every Thursday: they talked about diets, their children’s schools, cooking, and fashion. She had lived an organized and lady-like life—it had just not been suited to the time she lived in, for she had been more like a perfect 1930s housewife, her husband and children the center of her life, everything revolving around them. Her grandmother had often reproached her mother for not going out to work, “. . . and you a graduate of the American University in Cairo!” She had tried to urge her to find a job to prove herself, be independent, and have her own world outside the home, even if she did not necessarily need the money.

  Yasmine splashed water on her face, thinking furiously. If this woman had abandoned her outdated ideas and found a job, if she had had her own sense of self, perhaps then her husband’s betrayal would not have driven her to take her own life. Her life would have been filled with other people and relationships; but was a social support network enough to hold a fragile psyche together? She did not think so. Depression attacks a person whose psychology cannot fight back, and creeps in slowly, painting everything in life with the same drab color.

  There was a knock at the door: it was room service bearing coffee with milk. She stood at the window, looking out at the Eiffel Tower, snow piled up on its top, as flurries whirled around it in the wind. Just like these cold memories, she thought, that won’t get out of my head.

  The specter of her mother appeared before her, making herself a cup of coffee in the kitchen of their home, wearing her white silk robe, her blond hair spilling over her back. Yasmine was standing on tiptoe, trying and failing to reach the glass of water on the kitchen table. Her mother laughed and picked her up, handing her the glass of water with a kiss. She panicked: what if she dropped it? She folded her tiny fingers fiercely around it, and found herself just as fiercely gripping the mug of coffee in her hands as though it might slip away. Time seemed to soften and flow. Where was she now? Which of them was she? The little girl who couldn’t reach the table, or the grown woman alone in a room in Paris overlooking the Eiffel Tower? And why had that woman left her and gone away, when Yasmine still needed her?

  She rested her head on her mother’s shoulder and fell asleep. Her mother laid her gently on the bed. Her mother’s specter was teasing her: a tall, slim figure she could feel walking around the room so as not to wake her little girl, then turning off the light and closing the door behind her as she left.

  Trying to shake off the past, Yasmine got up off the bed and went to the window, but the memories came thick and fast. She remembered that long-ago winter with the biting cold of its days and nights and perpetually cloudy sky. When her mother had found out that her husband had betrayed her with her best friend, she had started out angry, threatening, screaming. Her father had left the house and gone to stay at a hotel. Then some close friends had intervened and convinced her to take him back, explaining it away as a momentary weakness that most men suffered from. When he came back, she would not share his bed and slept in another room. Day after day, she became a different woman: beaten, weak, and passive. She kept house as usual, but she performed her tasks mechanically, with no joy, and it seemed to take all her energy to do things. She no longer bestowed a smile here, a word there: even the things that used to bother or irritate her, such as walking on the rugs without taking off your shoes, or leaving wet towels on the bed, or leaving dirty glasses on the tables, no longer evoked any reaction. When her housework was done, she would retire to a chaise longue in a remote corner of the hall until the next day. She was absent, as though in another world.

  As time passed, she no longer took any care with her appearance: she stopped bathing and doing her hair, and never even changed clothes. Yasmine was sad and bitter because she didn’t know what to do to help her. She tried everything to get a rise out of her: she undid her braids so that her mother would have to rebraid her hair, she asked her to let her help with the housework, or invited her to sit and watch one of her favorite movies together, or told her she needed new clothes and wanted them to go shopping. Her mother would always refuse. A sense of real danger came over Yasmine, and she had talked to her grandmother about how far gone her mother was and how she was acting. The next day, when she came home from school, she found them together, and for the first time in weeks, she could hear her mother’s voice in the house. She was screaming hysterically at her grandmother: “Me? See a psychiatrist? Do I look crazy to you? What would I need a psychiatrist for? Leave me alone! I hate you, I hate you all!”

  She had wanted to run to her and hug her, and tell her how much she loved her. In a matter of weeks, her mother shriveled up like a dried fruit: her face grew pale and her form fragile and brittle. She ended her life, as the coroner told them, at 9:00 a.m., a little after they had all left the house. She must have planned it the night before. Yasmine remembered exactly how she had been that morning: she had been different from previous days. She had woken early, washed up, fixed her hair, and put on a pretty dress. She had baked pastries and made coffee and turned the radio on to Fairuz. Yasmine had been so delighted to find her that way, and a feeling had come over her that perhaps her mother would go back to being her old self, that she had found a way out of her problems and her sufferings, and that they would finally have a happy home again. She said goodbye to Yasmine and Shaza that day with a big hug, and stood at the window once again to wave them goodbye until the bus was out of sight.

  On the way home that day, Yasmine had been eager to see her mother, as if she was back from a long journey: the woman who had lived in their house had not been her mother, but a stranger. When she had placed the key in the lock and turned it, silence had filled the house. It was a strange silence, tinged with sorrow, fear, and suspicion, as though it concealed a shattering blow.

  She went straight to the kitchen. Everything was clean and in order, but she wasn’t there. “Mom? Mom?” she had called. She walked through every room in the house, looking for her. She thought that perhaps her mother had gone to the hairdresser, or shopping, or perhaps to visit her grandmother. She waited another hour and then called her grandmother to ask, “Is Mom there?”

  “No, she hasn’t been here today,” her grandmother answered, “and I called the house this morning and no one answered.”

  If her mother had been in her regular state of mind, her absence would not have been so concerning: Yasmine sometimes came home to find the house empty. For a moment, she thought that perhaps her mother had packed up and left the house entirely. She rushed to the bedroom and flung open the closet, but found everything in its place. She picked up the phone again and asked her father where her mother was, and he had no idea.

  Her grandmother arrived in haste and bombarded her with questions. “Did something happen? Did that man fight with her? Where could she have gone?”

  The phone never stopped ringing; neither did the doorbell. Her grandmother had called everyone they knew, family and friends alike, asking after her. She paced in circles in the room, quest
ions circling around her as she did so. “Please, don’t worry so much!” Yasmine had begged her. “It’s okay! This morning she was feeling much better: she was smiling again, she listened to Fairuz, and she hugged me and Shaza when we left for school. She hasn’t done that in forever!”

  The words stopped in her throat. Had her mother been saying goodbye because she was getting ready to leave for the last time? Fear chilled her and her heart clenched. She retreated to a far corner, suddenly sensing that something had happened—a disaster so momentous it was inexpressible.

  She watched them scurrying around and pacing the hallway, rushing to the phone whenever it rang, running to the door whenever the doorbell chimed, hoping it was her. Only Yasmine knew that she was never coming back. Her eyes never left the wall clock: its hands rotated monotonously, hour after hour, and the air grew heavy with a weight that pressed on the soul, making it groan, only affirming Yasmine’s intuition when her father announced that he was going out to search the hospitals and the police stations for her.

  He went into the bedroom to get dressed, then let out a yell that shook the house to its foundations. He had tried to open the door of their en-suite bathroom to wash up, but found the door blocked with something heavy. It was a body, lying on the bathroom floor, the soul long gone and flitting like a butterfly far away. How had no one looked in there before?

  Shaza and her grandmother rushed to the scene: Yasmine never stirred. Her feet were rooted to the spot and she felt the room spin. She lost consciousness. It had been a mercy: she never had to see her beloved mother’s body lying in a pool of her own blood on the bathroom floor.

  Her mother had chosen a sharp blade to slash her wrists. Later, the question would not leave her: where had her mother gotten the blade? Her father had not used that type of razor for a long time, having switched to an electric shaver years ago. Had she gone out and bought it specially? Yasmine couldn’t imagine it: someone going out to buy a tool to end their life.

  She found herself speaking aloud, alone in the cold room: “Were you hiding in that corner all those weeks and months to plan it? What a damned painful end! Why couldn’t you have chosen something kinder to yourself and to us?” Her voice rang out in the empty room. “Why did you pick that morning to make yourself up, to put on perfume, to wear a nice dress? Did you like the idea of leaving us that much?” Tears were rolling down her face. “Why didn’t you think of us? Of your two little girls who needed you?” She was screaming now. “You never stopped to think it would be a nightmare that would haunt us for the rest of our lives!”

  Her mother had slit her wrists in her parents’ bathroom on a grey day in February, and the curtain had fallen on the final scene of their marriage. Afterward, their father—whom everyone had blamed for what happened—had left the country, and the girls had gone to be raised by their grandmother. The apartment had been closed up, its grief locked inside it for years, until her grandmother had decided to rent it out, furnished—with all its furniture, bedclothes, photographs and paintings on the walls, and all the memories of the family who had once lived there.

  Everyone avoided talking about what had happened, and many neighbors, friends. and family members could or would not realize that the woman who had ended her life in this fashion had not been “a sinner,” as they called her. She had been ill, and her illness had been what had led her to end her life in this manner. In her normal state of mind, she would never have done it: she loved life, and her family, and her husband. The source of her unhappiness was that she had loved too much; if she had loved less, she would not have met such a fate.

  Painful memories flooded forth like a waterfall in that hotel room in Paris, as though the gales blustering outside had only stirred them up. “Smile! You are in Paris!” a tourist sign had proclaimed. “Smile,” Yasmine said to herself in the mirror, “you’re in Paris.” She pasted a smile on her face. She had to get herself out of this pit of painful memories. She dialed the numbers of a few friends she had made during her student days in Paris, and made dinner plans.

  The next morning, she chose a classic, elegant outfit, to match the event she was to attend, and had breakfast at the hotel. She lost count of the cups of coffee she drank to wake herself up, then hurried off to catch the opening session of the conference. The radio announcer at Good Morning Paris rattled off the weather report: sunny with some clouds and rain in the afternoon. The taxi took her to the Paris Hilton, where the conference was being held.

  The conference hall was thronged with people: association members, artists, journalists, and a large contingent of the general public. She caught sight of Professor Stefan sitting in the audience and sat next to him.

  The conference started with an introductory speech by the head of the association, and for two hours, the conference speakers presented their papers. In the break, everyone went to the dining room for coffee, tea, and cakes. She found herself sitting at a round table with Professor Stefan and the director of the association who had received them in his office the previous day, and several other men. Suddenly, the director shot to his feet and made a beeline for two men standing in a corner. He interrupted their conversation, addressing himself to one of them, a tall, athletic-looking man with carefully coiffed hair. After a minute, the director gestured to her to come over. “Mademoiselle Yasmine Ghaleb,” he introduced her, “a professor and researcher of art history from Egypt. Monsieur René Andrea, head of the Military History Archives.”

  The man eyed her as they shook hands. “She is making preparations to begin an exhaustive research project into Napoleon’s campaign in the East—military, artistic, and scientific.”

  Andrea’s military rigidity unbent, and he smiled, suddenly appearing attractive. “I would be honored to assist you,” he said, “you are more than welcome at any time. You can come by my office today after the conference if it is convenient: I will be there until five.”

  “Where is ‘there’?”

  “The Musée de l’Armée.” He gave her his business card.

  “Thank you,” she smiled and nodded, making her way back to her table, rejoined a few moments later by the director of the Association for Art History.

  “You will find all the information you need with Monsieur Andrea,” he told her. “His field is Bonaparte’s military history. He knows every detail of Napoleon’s campaigns and wars. With a little judicious questioning and a little discretion, I’m sure you will be able to find the information you’re looking for.”

  His words rang in her ears as she made her way to Andrea’s office after the conference. The taxi rattled through the streets and the trees flashed past the window, one after the other, “With a little discretion,” he had said, “you will be able to find the information.”

  The taxi let her off a few meters from the Musée de l’Armée, which was surrounded by a high wall. Cars were not permitted inside, so she had to walk. In any case, it was two o’clock in the afternoon, and the weather was warmer at this time of day. As she walked through the grounds, she wondered what he had meant by “with a little discretion.”

  The museum was guarded by an impressive security presence. She informed the guards at the door that she had an appointment with the head of the museum. She passed through a great many electronic doors until she finally made her way inside. The building was quiet. There were several exhibition halls displaying the various weaponry used by the military and the uniforms worn by soldiers and officers through the ages. There were even special display cases for boots, helmets, and ammunition. On her other side, there were paintings glorifying the wars undertaken by the French Empire throughout its history.

  The silence was broken by the click of her heels on the wooden floors. She stopped at a case bearing a gold necklace with a diamond embedded in it. Underneath it was a plaque: “The Grand Master Medal: The Medal of Honor of Napoleon I.” She took a tour around the entrance, which displayed many military pieces: cannons, pistols, helmets, arrows, and all the instruments of killin
g that had been used in wars. There was a great cannon in the center of the hall, with a plaque beneath it indicating that it had been used in Napoleon’s campaign in Egypt. I wonder how many Egyptian lives were lost to you? she thought. How many mothers lost their sons, how many children you orphaned?

  Having seen enough, she hurried up the stairs to the first floor, where Andrea was waiting for her.

  The room was as elegant as its occupant. He welcomed her warmly and invited her to take a seat. He had the window open, and the room felt freezing. Noticing that she had wrapped herself more tightly in her coat, he got up and closed the window. “Right. Fill me in.”

  For a moment she lost her concentration, unsure where to start. He noticed and left his desk, heading for the coffeemaker on a side table. He busied himself with making them two cups of espresso, and handed her one. Watching him, she could see that he seemed younger and less formal than his position would seem to indicate. They sipped their coffee and made small talk of the weather, Paris, and his last visit to Cairo. She felt comfortable with him, and forgot her first impression of him and Professor Stefan’s words of warning. She began to talk, telling him of everything that had transpired since she had found the painting, and her long journey in search of the artist, that had brought her to his office. He listened with what seemed to be rapt attention. “Rest assured,” he said, “I’ll do all I can to help you. I like you.”

  She did not quite understand what “I like you” could possibly mean. Did he mean he liked her as a woman, or that he was interested in her research?