by Anna Perera
Stunned, Aaron races down the pavement to the traffic lights to catch up with her, but a moment later he sees her getting into a gray car to sit beside an older man with a bushy beard. The car shoots off in a puff of exhaust, leaving him standing there, bewildered. Shareen had golden sandals on her dainty feet. A silver chain on her wrist. Where did she get them from? Who was that man? Where’s Daniel?
Still amazed, Aaron hurries toward Omar’s perfume shop, bracing himself for answers he doesn’t want to hear when he gets back to Mokattam. He hopes that Shareen will be home by then and that there’s an innocent reason for her being out alone in Cairo with a man who clearly isn’t a Zabbaleen. Maybe it wasn’t her after all.
On he races past windows packed with patterned galabeyas, shawls, and scarves, then stalls selling painted papyrus and King Tut souvenirs. But Aaron senses something isn’t quite right before he reaches the shop. He suddenly stops in his tracks. What he sees fills him with panic and disbelief.
With the constant sound of traffic behind him, Aaron gazes at the empty, sun-speckled shop windows and the hummocks of dust on the smudged glass shelves and then the huge, dark, closed doors with a half-alive fly buzzing by a sign which reads “Closed for Remodeling.”
Grabbing the window, Aaron presses his face to the glass and peers inside at a rolling expanse of space. Empty but for a stained red carpet, a strip of metal on the floor, and what looks like the corner of an oil lamp on the far wall.
Distraught, he swallows back hot tears. The window mists from his breathing. He wipes the glass with the back of his hand and the full force of the emptiness of the room hurts his eyes and freezes his mind. Turning to slump against the window, his shoulders make a grinding noise on the glass that he can feel in his stomach. Not now. He needed this.
Aaron blunders to the alley in search of glass. Anything that can feed his desire for beauty. Squinting away from the sun, the first thing he notices is that the side window is partly open. Below is a cardboard box and the firm shape proves it’s packed with rejected bottles. With the swish of cars in his ear, Aaron fills his pockets with as many small bottles as possible. Pale bottles without stoppers. A slender pink one with a twisted rim. A miniature blue bottle decorated with a broken leaf. And cheap, plain, oddly shaped bottles that rub together like marbles and land on the rose-colored bottle of perfume that he’s kept forever in his pocket. All of them rolling and clunking as he runs.
Soon he’s part of the pack. Part of the streets, the people, traffic, noise, heat. The madness of the city. A glass collector again.
Chapter Twenty-two
A New Beginning
“What happened to you? You look different. Older,” Luke Mebaj says.
“Dunno. Dunno,” Aaron gasps as he climbs on the cart.
Slumped in the back, an overpowering weakness takes over and all Aaron can do is clutch his chest, close his eyes, and be thankful he caught up with the Mebaj cart after putting his life at risk by leaping in front of a bus and racing across the street.
Soon—the second he can speak—he’ll ask them the question that’s on the tip of his tongue. Right now the stem of a bottle is digging into his thigh. Aaron twists around, rubs the spot, and rearranges the empty reject bottles in his pockets until the full and perfect bottle that he’s carefully hung on to slips into the corner of the denim, protected from harm.
Joseph Mebaj glances at Aaron before clicking the reins, then says, “Something up?”
“Nah!” Aaron mutters.
He’s used to Michael and Inga not saying much, so he shuts down and lets the question drift. It feels strange to be on a cart again, surrounded by bags of oozing trash. He gazes at the traffic like someone who belongs in a wide, empty desert, not this stinking heap of junk. The cars, buses, and taxis are crowded with people whose faces reflect his and behind their eyes is the same yearning for something better, something good. Something more meaningful than getting through the day swinging from crisis to crisis and then sorting out the debris.
Aaron’s mind travels back to Omar’s shop and the customers who went there to buy more than perfumes. More than a pretty bottle with luscious scents. Some went to buy oils to heal their souls, to bring back a feeling of connection to their bodies in the hope it would turn their lives around.
“He brought my missing soul back to me!” Aaron once heard a customer say.
“Omar is an ancient shaman!” his assistant would boast. “He’s as mysterious as this city.”
Who knows when the shop will open again? Aaron can’t quite believe it is closed. His mind turns to the city’s extraordinary past; to the fact that Mary, Joseph, and Jesus passed this way once. Did they stop in front of the pyramids of Giza and wonder if they were used as star maps and a means to communicate with other life forms, as Omar said?
Or did they believe they were a way to help the pharaohs to the afterlife, as they were taught in school?
“Nothing can satisfy our minds like the kinds of journeys we are capable of when we use our imaginations. Only then can we discover the truth,” Omar also said.
As the cart slows to a snail’s pace, the sun blinks fiercely at Aaron from behind the shopping complex. He holds up an arm to blot it out, then ducks behind the nearest bag, which cracks like a whip. Stuck there with the smell of rotting fish and an old water pipe in his face, it dawns on Aaron that he can revisit the shop whenever he wants.
All he has to do is use his imagination.
Now when Aaron remembers the shop, he sees it through his mother’s eyes. He almost smiles her smile as the huge wooden doors judder open. Sprinkled with sunshine, the bottles glimmer on the shelves and the interior glints like a sultana’s boudoir with rich velvet cushions and brass lamps. Soon soft, padding footsteps cross the polished floor to greet the woman with a rag held to her weeping eyes. Omar takes her hand, Aaron’s mother’s hand, and tells her not to worry.
Not to cry.
Then Omar leads her to the corner to sit down and says she doesn’t have to pay him. He’s happy to give her his time. Whether she’s a Zabbaleen or not is nothing to him. He asks about her life. About her son. About her pains. He listens. He offers her kindness and good wishes. Then he lifts a stick from a black ceramic vase and soaks it in Rose of the Nile perfume, offering it to her with the promise that the scent will bring her the peace she seeks.
The cart suddenly jerks. The water pipe smacks Aaron on the head as the traffic comes to a stop, forcing his mind to snap back to the busy Cairo street. He throws the pipe at a passing truck at the very moment a fighter plane screams across the sky. As the vapor trail fades, Aaron’s heart softens. Softens when he remembers the peaceful expression on his mother’s face when it was all over. The half-smile. The tilted head.
Aaron lowers his eyes. He wishes he could fly over the streets, over the nearby bazaar and tall buildings. Over the citadel to the slums of Mokattam and a time when everything felt possible. A time before she died.
As the cart follows the curve in the road leading to the entrance to the village, Aaron grasps a smooth knot of wood on the side of the cart, realizing he is suddenly nervous to be back. The nearer they come to the high arch, the louder the tapping and thudding ring out from the foundry. The moment they leave the arch and dusty pillars behind, he flinches, burying his nose in his hands, and when the brothers halt the pony to deliver a broken TV to Sami, Aaron swings his legs over the side and leaps off. He glances briefly at the stool beside the counter but Rachel’s not there.
The sun sinks and the dark cavelike shops and stalls crawl with half-human shapes.
He’d forgotten how badly Mokattam smells. As he weaves through the endless trash lining the walls of the shops and stalls, Ishaq, the icon seller, gives him a welcoming nod. Habi flings an orange at Aaron with an understanding smile and, though no one asks what happened, it seems everyone knows he’s been staying at Michael’s and that he’s sorry. Each step brings another nod, a silent message to say, So you’re back? It may
not be the greatest of welcomes, but at least they know who he is, unlike the people who live in Michael’s apartment building. They give Aaron the courage to stand on top of a mound of garbage bags and steady himself before cupping his mouth in his hands.
“SORRRRRY!” he yells.
The Mebaj brothers turn round and laugh. Everyone in the lane laughs. Their attention puts a spring in Aaron’s step as he hurries toward his stepfamily’s home. But the spring in his step dies suddenly when he sees Jacob up ahead with a bunch of men who are counting out white pills in the palms of their hands. Empty brown medicine bottles lie at their feet.
“Jacob!” Aaron shouts as he gets closer. “Why aren’t you out on the cart?”
“Hey, Aaron.” Jacob looks scared. “I—yeah …” There’s no hint of a smile on his red, swollen face and sunken eyes.
“His cousin’s taken over until he gets better,” one of the men says.
“I’ve got that skin disease.” Jacob holds out his bony arms, which are bleeding from where he’s been scratching an ugly rash. Then he lifts up his T-shirt to show a stomach marked with the same blistering scabs. “It’s driving me crazy.”
By the patches of limestone dust on his ears, nose and hands, Aaron sees that living in Mokattam is adding to Jacob’s problems and the terrible state he’s in. “What did they say at the clinic?”
“They gave me some cream, but I’ve used it all up. I should get some more,” Jacob mumbles, tripping slightly. One of his friends catches him. “If we’d kept that necklace I could have sold it and afforded the best doctor.”
His new friend places an arm around his sagging shoulder.
“What did you do with it?” Aaron asks. It seems to him that Jacob needs more than money or a skin doctor now.
“Noha gave it to the priest,” his friend answers for him.
The quick response is an excuse for them all to nod in a self-righteous way—as if they would have given it to the priest too. All the while covering up their real problem, which isn’t what they might have done with the necklace, but something more ordinary—drugs.
Aaron’s sure that Jacob is lying. He hasn’t been to the clinic. Aaron doesn’t bother to look back as he walks away disappointed, sad and full of suspicion that Noha will try to persuade him to help the cousin collect medical waste. If Aaron wants to eat that might be his only option. The thought makes him shudder. Makes him want to run for his life.
When he reaches the last alley he hears the familiar sound of Abe thudding a ball against a concrete wall. Before the boy sees him Aaron shouts, “Hiya.”
“Where you been?” Abe cries, clapping the ball to his chest and admiring Aaron’s new jeans.
“Nowhere much.” Aaron grins. “Anything happened?”
“Nah. Nothing.”
“Nothing?” Aaron sighs. “You sure?” He eyes Abe closely before asking, “What about Rachel?”
“Oh, her? She’s back home.”
Suddenly understanding what he’s getting at, Abe smiles. Aaron wants to hear Mokattam news, not what he’s been doing.
“Rachel’s leg was in a fat cast. Her knee still bends funny. Lijah married Shovel Face and Shareen disappeared.”
Rachel’s here. Aaron grins to himself.
“I saw Shareen getting into a car in Cairo,” he says out loud.
“She ran away just after you left,” Abe says. “Daniel went crazy looking for her and everyone’s been praying for her to come back. Nobody knows why she went.”
“Where’s the wheelbarrow?”
“Old man Mebaj bought it,” Abe tells him. “Oh, right.” Aaron nods.
“Why do you think she left?” Abe asks, curious for his opinion.
Aaron thinks for a moment. He understands exactly why Shareen left.
“She married an old man. It wasn’t her dream,” he explains. “That’s why she went.”
“Yeah, but she didn’t have to,” Abe says.
“Her father made her marry Daniel. Anyway, she may have escaped Mokattam but not old men. She got into a car with one.”
“Maybe he’s rich?”
Abe’s about to mention the merchant’s latest stupid price offering, the argument with the council about their new fleet of trucks, and the trouble his mom’s having hiding her pig, when the sound of a high-pitched wailing interrupts them.
It’s coming from the next lane, where Aaron’s old home is. They take to their heels, stumbling over bags, with a thousand possible disasters flashing through their minds.
A crushed white plastic bottle rolls over Aaron’s feet as he slows down to approach a dozen men and women in front of his stepfamily’s open room, which is dripping with trash and food slop. From a nearby home the Christian radio station is echoing a recent speech of Pope Shenouda III. Out of fear, Aaron hangs back while Abe rushes in. His first thought is that Lijah’s beaten someone up, probably his new wife, and he’d rather not look at the result.
Stepping backwards, Aaron tries to avoid being noticed, but a cranky man with a solid jaw commands him to come closer with a wave of his arm. Aaron hesitates and Abe pushes back through the group to join his friend. Slightly apprehensive that Aaron’s going to react badly to what he’s just seen, Abe grabs his hand, squeezing it tightly.
“Get off.” Aaron’s embarrassed by his affection.
Abe laughs, then pulls a sad face. “Hosi had a heart attack.”
“Is that all?” Aaron was expecting something worse. “No, he’s dead now!” Abe says. “He’s still warm but he’s dead.”
“I heard you.”
Aaron doesn’t feel anything much except relief. He shivers for a second before realizing he’ll never have to listen to his snoring again. He’ll never again have to look at Hosi’s ugly, gnarled hands. Now there’s no one over him and he’s glad to see the back of him. Aaron knows it’s wrong to feel what he feels, but he can’t help it. His life has just changed for the better.
In a strange way, Hosi’s death also means that Lijah is suddenly irrelevant. Youssa the drunk is head of the family now and no one can know how that will work out. Even so, neither stepbrother can demand the kind of respect from Aaron that Hosi could as an elderly stepfather. A whole layer of judgement has fallen away and it feels good. Very good. As if his death has given birth to a new life for Aaron.
A new beginning.
The family is going to need his help more than ever now and he won’t have to return to medical-waste clearing again. He can go back to collecting glass like he wants. But even that pleasant thought doesn’t help him take the twenty steps needed to see Hosi’s dead body on the dirty ground.
A light rain begins to fall as Aaron hightails it back down the alley before Lijah or someone else insists he pay the proper respects to his stepfather. The damaged perfume bottles clink, hum, and vibrate in his pockets as he runs toward the pony yard, enjoying the fantasy that Rachel will be there waiting for him. Abe doesn’t try to follow him. He knows well enough that when Aaron’s in the mood to take off, he’s also in the mood to be on his own.
Firing on all cylinders, Aaron turns the corner to the yard and stops abruptly at the shock of seeing three scraggy ponies nosing the bare, dark earth and no water in the trough. Littered with dirty cigarette cartons, lighters, and used tissues, the place is disgusting. He’d convinced himself Rachel would be here, but now he’s glad she isn’t.
His gaze wanders to the disappearing hills in the cloudy darkness and the smell of pony flesh mixes with the stink of dung. The memory of the beautiful, velvety night the last time he was here with Michael briefly returns and a tiny smile crosses his face as he picks up the rubbish and adds it to the pile in the lane before filling the trough with water from the hose.
Having time to himself makes him feel free. He’d rather be here, out in the open, than cooped up on Michael’s sofa, listening to the sound of motorbikes revving up in the square. Michael and Inga have cared for him so kindly, he’s grateful, but being part of the shadows feels familia
r and safe. But what about the empty reject bottles he took from the alley beside the shop this morning? Where can he hide them? Does he need to hide them? The straggles of hay behind the shelter aren’t big enough to disguise a box of matches, let alone all this glass. Why not throw them away? Or try and sell them to Faisal. He won’t care where they’ve come from. But then people are always watching Faisal. They’ll see Aaron trying to offload the bottles and get angry with him for stealing. It’s clear they’re only good for melting down. But to Aaron they’re windows to look at the world through and something to call his own. His bottles. His glass.
Deep in thought, Aaron moves behind the ramshackle shelter and shivers. The blackness feels like a demon that’s about to pounce. Aaron pauses to glance at three wheel spindles beside the wire fence and for a moment thinks they’re vicious snakes. He wants to strangle them even though he knows they’re not real. The real snakes are weaving in and out of his mind, not the creepy fence.
Hosi’s last words come back to him: “You’ve cost me my reputation. Stay away from my family. You don’t think about anyone but yourself.”
The sudden echo of a distant barking dog brings Aaron back to his body with a jolt. The world around him returns: the rickety shelter, the wheel spindles, the straggles of hay, and the wide, dark sky.
Wandering to the front of the yard, Aaron watches the ponies nuzzling each other while sniffing the air. He sits cross-legged on the hard earth with the sound of rustling and pony snorts in his ears. Carefully, he inches lumps of earth out with his fingernails and soon a small mound forms beside his knee. When the hole is big enough, he lines the clinking rejects up one by one to examine the stems and bases for defects, as he’s always done. All except the one perfect bottle. The veil of night disguises their beauty, making them just bottles, not things capable of holding, transforming and reflecting light.
In a few deft movements, Aaron buries them quickly, patting the ground with his hands and then stamping the uneven bits with his feet. It’s done. He eyes the ponies for a second before climbing over the fence to mingle with them, breathing in the smell of their skin. With both hands, Aaron rubs the gray one’s bristly neck, then, when tiredness sweeps in, lies down beside the biggest pony to sleep, arm across his rising and falling stomach. Throughout the night, Aaron jerks awake several times, looks around, remembers where he is, and goes straight back to sleep.
