The Garden of Last Days

by Andre Dubus III

  A family moves quickly past. The woman holds an infant and the hand of a young boy who hurries beside her. The man carries a girl. Her head rests upon his shoulder and her eyes are open and her thumb is inside her closed mouth.

  O Lord, I ask You for the best of this place, and ask You to protect me from its evils. Bassam waits for the glass to swing open once more, and then he follows this American family into the matar.

  The line for tickets is short. Very soon they are standing before a kafir who, behind the long counter, asks for their names and their destinations.

  “Los Angeles,” says Bassam.

  “Name?”

  “Al-Jizani.”

  “Spell it, please.” The kafir is older than they and tall, his shoulders rounded downward beneath his shirt. He wears the eyeglasses of the aging, the sort that is only half as high so he may look at them over the lenses. Bassam spells for him his family name, as well as Imad’s and Tariq’s, though these are no longer their names.

  “ID, please?” The man briefly regards their driving licenses from Florida, and he thanks them without looking in their eyes. “Checking baggage?”

  “No thank you.”

  And the kafir directs them to their gate and prints their passes, and when he hands them to Bassam, how strange it is to receive these from a large and aging kafir who does not even know, Allah willing, he has given three shuhada’ their tickets to Jannah.

  But the gate. They must first pass through security at the gate.

  “Bassam, Tariq,” says Imad, “this way.” And he points to the area so close by, a short line there as well, men and women dressed in business clothing, an old couple, and the young American family. Imad is nearly smiling. He stops and says, “Stay calm, brothers. Al-Aziz is with us. Make your du’a for meeting the enemy.”

  They walk slowly. There is a Starbucks coffee shop, four or five kufar waiting to be served. There is a shop for newspapers, books, and magazines, again the colors of bare flesh. Bassam looks away to the broad back of Imad before him. Beyond are the matar security guards in their white and black uniforms and their sensors and X-ray machines. Again, the dryness of his mouth and throat, the need for water, and now the need to relieve himself. “Tariq, Imad, please.”

  The bathroom area is large with a long row of many sinks before a mirror, and Bassam enters the privacy of the enclosed walls and locks the metal door. He lowers his pants and sits. There are the sounds of water running in the sinks, footsteps upon the floor, the flushing of toilets, the main door as it opens and closes. A hand dryer is activated. A kafir answers his ringing cell phone, speaks into it. “Yeah, I’ll be in Denver tonight.”

  These people and their assumptions. How they never invoke the Holy One when discussing the future, how it is simply believed by them they control their own destiny and no one else.

  Bassam reaches for the paper. Above the dispenser are scratchings from a pen, the drawing of a man’s erectness and his seed leaving it, a telephone number beneath. The whore, her rising and falling onto him. Again, his weakness, the feeling he has just begun to know women in this world, and now he must leave.

  This cursed place! Everywhere a temptation. Everywhere a stronghold for Shaytan.

  Bassam cleans himself and flushes the toilet. Allah, forgive me.

  His bag beside him, he washes his hands a very long time, the water quite hot. The mirror begins to fog slightly and in it is his face, the nose and mouth of his mother, but the eyes of his father, the eyes of his father when his belief was still pure, when Bassam had only ten or eleven years and his father returned from the hajj. The family compound was filled with joy, his mother and aunts cooking and passing out gifts and offering praise to the Creator. Bassam’s uncle Rashad had slaughtered a goat and a sheep, donating the meat of the goat to two poor families outside Khamis Mushayt. And Bassam and his brothers ate the roasted sheep with the men in the outer building. His father had never looked so young to him, so strong and free of his worries. His beard appeared darker, his eyes shone, and he sat straight but with humility, and when his eyes passed over Bassam, Bassam felt his father’s love pass through him straight from the Creator, for his father had made the holy pilgrimage to Makkah. His father, Ahmed al-Jizani, was now a hajji.

  “Bassam.” Tariq appears in the glass. “Imad waits for us. And do not forget. Act calmly.”

  Bassam nods his head. There are three other men at the sinks, two white kufar and one Asian. Each in the shirt and tie of a businessman. Each washing his hands. Each in his own thoughts. And why does Tariq call him Bassam and not Mansoor as he did earlier? Has Bassam not changed since they were boys? Is he the same youngest son of Ahmed al-Jizani, forever in the long shadow he casts? Is this what Tariq sees? Why does Tariq not call him Victorious?

  Bassam splashes his face. No, Tariq calls you Bassam because he has always done this. You must stop looking for negative signs. This is only the work of Shaytan. Do not forget the mala’ika who guided you here. Allah is all we need. He is the best to rely upon. He is the greatest.

  Once again in the matar, the same noise as before: the voices of announcers over the system, the rings of cell phones—one nearby, a musical tune—the rolling of luggage wheels and the clicking of women’s shoes upon the floors and throughout all of this is talking, incessant talking.

  A hand squeezes Bassam’s shoulder. Tariq nods and smiles as if Bassam has just told him a funny story. “You look too serious, Mansoor.”

  “Yes, all right.” The smell of Tariq, his cologne, his shaved face and washed hair, the hotel’s shampoo. Their knives are each in inner pockets inside the carrying bags. They are allowed, but now is the test. Now is the test.

  A woman has carried her child through the X-ray doorway, and the guard beckons to her husband, who holds a girl. He follows.

  Imad places his bag on the moving beltway. He takes a plastic bowl and puts into it coins and his watch with its silver band, one Bassam knows he purchased in Peshawar. He holds his pass, and the guard, his belly protruding, his pants too long, he motions Imad forward. The X-ray doorway of course remains silent, but Bassam’s heart thrusts now inside his head for he is watching the woman guard who studies the screen of what is shown in the bags. She is of middle age, and she has changed the color of her hair to blond and she chews gum, her eyes narrowed upon her work. Tariq is now called to enter, and surely Imad’s bag has passed through and still the woman’s eyes do not change.

  Yes, Bassam can see it, Imad grasping it and walking away from them.

  Bassam places his bag onto the beltway. There are only a few coins remaining in his pocket and he wishes he had given them all to the driver so he might avoid this extra step. He takes the gray bowl and drops into it his coins. His watch is plastic and glass and he leaves it upon his wrist. And look, Bassam, Tariq is walking away with his bag now as well.

  Bassam’s heart slows slightly, but his breath is shallow, his tongue thick. He prays he does not appear the way he feels.

  “Come through, please.” The kafir regards him. He looks quickly from his face to his shoes as if he is sorting pomegranates, putting the new here, the old there, and he is bored with his duties and has been for a very long time.

  Bassam passes through.

  “Have a nice day, sir.”

  “Yes. Thank you.”

  There it is, his bag exiting the machine and rolling down to his waiting hand. No kafir speaks to him. No kafir stops him. He squeezes tightly the handle and he begins walking. There is a calmness, a warmth and a lightness in his arms and legs and face and heart, as if he is water that these twenty-six years has been contained in a vessel and now the vessel is broken and what he viewed before as himself has spilled free and there is no fear at the sudden lack of clay walls to hold him.

  “Sir? Sir?”

  There is no god but Allah. Bassam turns. It is the kafir guard. He smiles and holds forth the container of loose coins. “Don’t forget this now.”

  “Yes, thank you.” Ba
ssam releases his breath he did not know he was withholding. He steps forward and allows the man to pour the money into his cupped hand. All praise is for Allah by whose favor good works are accomplished. Then Bassam turns and joins his brothers, who await him in the crowd.

  LONNIE WOKE AT noon. He found he was out of coffee and drove into town. The inside of his truck was hot, and the AC wasn’t cooling it off fast enough, and he rolled down his window, the air smelling like palm fronds and newly turned dirt. He needed to buy some groceries. Get something in the fridge. He thought of April dumping him to go shopping. He could’ve gone with her. Felt pathetic for thinking that.

  At the corner of Osprey and Ringling, he stopped for the light, a car pulling up beside him, its windows open, the radio on. He heard the word hijacked, then more words. The woman behind the wheel was shaking her head, her mouth half-open. She stared into the empty intersection.

  He turned on his own radio.

  “Sweat is dry and feet are in the sand

  If there were only water—”

  He ejected the tape, found a news station, but they were all news.

  Adrenaline. That old dangerous friend. Such a gush of it, his arm and legs as light as razors, and it was like the whole club had erupted into a hundred open pockets, yet there was nowhere for him to go, no one to defend.

  AJ COULD ONLY think of Cole.

  No, he kept feeling him. His small body on his lap, his feet knocking against AJ’s shins while they ate together somewhere. Or lying down beside him reading him a book, his son’s head against AJ’s arm. How could his father not be with him right now? How could he not be there in their hurricaneproof house, his rifle loaded, guarding the door from whoever these people were?

  Did his son know about this? Did Deena? Was she letting him watch it on the TV? AJ hoped not. Lord, he hoped not, and sitting here beneath the tiers in his orange clothes on an orange bench bolted into an orange table, watching hell come to pass in a room full of bad men, it occurred to him he should pray. But with so much suffering, where should he start? My God, where should he begin?

  Then the tower collapsed into its own rising plume, and one of the men laughed. Some sonofabitch was laughing.

  IT WAS A day of celebration. It was a day April and Franny and Jean had planned to spend together, and they did. After a breakfast of pancakes down in Jean’s, Franny sitting on two gardening books at the peninsula, her voice high and cheerful, April had gone back upstairs and made turkey and cheese sandwiches. She wrapped them in foil and placed them in the beach bag with clementines and pears, three carrots, and the box of Ritz crackers. Her kitchen was washed in sunlight and she hummed a song she knew but couldn’t name.

  This morning, waking up beside Franny, the room was lit from outside the color of roses. There was her sleeping daughter’s leg over hers. If April had ever prayed before, she couldn’t remember when or why. But in that moment she felt blessed by something large and loving, far away but close too. She pulled Franny into her and kissed her cheek. She thought of her mother. Imagined her waking up in that empty house. Supposedly happy. Smoking alone in the kitchen while her coffee brewed. Today April would call her. She and Franny both.

  But first, the beach.

  It was Tuesday morning in mid-September and only a handful of people had come. Most of them were on the main beach and not here, the palm fronds flicking in a warm beeze, Franny and Jean making a sand hill. Jean wore her straw hat, sunglasses, and a blue bathing suit she covered with an unbuttoned overshirt. April could see the varicose veins behind her knees and down her calves, the liver spots on her gardener’s hands. Franny kept filling the bucket and dumping it in front of Jean, Franny’s high, nearly breathless voice telling her what to do with the sand and where to put it.

  April couldn’t go look for work in Miami, not that far. Tomorrow she’d drive up to Tampa and check out that national chain. See what the house fees were. Ask about the clientele.

  Because look how happy Franny was with Jean. They couldn’t leave her.

  At ten before three, April pulled into the bank’s parking lot. Jean looked hot and tired on the passenger side, though she was still upbeat, turning around to talk to Franny about the Slush Puppie she planned to get her after this errand, the iced coffee she was going to buy herself. But her color wasn’t good. She’d worn that sun hat all day but her face was pale and sweaty and April left the engine running, the AC on high, and ran across the hot asphalt with her pocketbook full of money.

  The bank was cool and smelled like polished wood and coins. One man was at a teller’s window, the rest empty. He turned and gave her the once-over, his eyes lingering on her breasts beneath her top, and she ignored him and set her pocketbook on the counter and pulled out the cash. She began to count it. She’d spent some on the Chinese food with Lonnie, more on the new things for Franny’s room, more for groceries. But there were still sixty-four one-hundred-dollar bills. Six thousand four hundred dollars. The foreigner’s fingers on her. His hair already thinning. His cigarette smoke rising above them.

  There was a fifty and a few twenties and she folded them and pushed them into the front pocket of her shorts and filled out a deposit slip. The man was gone. April went to the window where he’d been. The rest of the tellers were counting money, closing up. It was a woman her age or younger, a curl of blond hair at her neck, her skin a golden mocha. And it was like being Stephanie, seeing a younger, prettier girl who could leave all this and make some real money if she dared to, if she had what it took. April said hi and pushed the cash and deposit slip under the glass, never feeling more proud of who she was or how much money she’d made on her own.

  The girl turned to her keyboard. From the side she looked older, her mouth downturned. She typed in April’s account number and counted the money quick as a machine, but she looked like a drooping flower.

  “Long one?”

  “Yep.” The girl shook her head. She stacked the money and began dividing it into thousands. “I can’t believe we stayed open. The whole country should stop just out of respect.” She slipped a band over ten hundreds, reached for another. “My uncle worked in one of those buildings. My mom’s been calling his cell phone all day.”

  “What buildings?”

  The girl stopped counting. She turned toward April, the stool squeaking. The whites of her eyes were pink. “You haven’t heard?”

  “No, what? I haven’t heard what?”

  She turned and looked over her shoulder, then back at April, her expression almost angry. “Are you serious? Do you really not know what’s just happened to us?”

  THE DAYS AND nights of television. The images she wouldn’t let Franny see. It was September and maybe it was time to find a preschool for her, but April couldn’t even think of driving her off and leaving her somewhere. There was the feeling she’d been given a great gift while others were robbed of everything.

  She called home a lot. Just to hear her mother’s voice. She even called Mary in Connecticut. They talked a long while about their kids, how much they loved them, Mary’s voice breaking. She said they should come visit them soon. “Please, April. Soon.”

  April spent her mornings with Franny and Jean at the beach. After, they’d share a lunch down in Jean’s kitchen or in the shade of the mango on the Adirondack chairs, Franny on one of their laps, and in the afternoons, after a bath to wash off the sand, April would lie down with Franny on her bed and read her a story and sometimes she’d fall asleep with her. She’d curl up around her, her nose in her damp hair. There was the feeling she was in a temporary state of grace, one that could not last long, and she knew she should drive up to Tampa or down to Venice to look for work.

  One afternoon in late September, she slid out of Franny’s bed and went into the kitchen. She poured cold coffee into a cup and heated it in the microwave. She pulled the phone book from its drawer and opened to the yellow pages, but when she opened to the E section, there was Entertainment—Children and Family, then the phone nu
mbers of animal trainers, puppeteers, and clowns. Below that was Entertainment—Others, nothing but Exotic Dancers and Escort Services, and she closed the book and carried her coffee to the living room.

  She would call, she would have to, but not now, maybe tomorrow morning when the manager or owner would be around. She flicked on the television. It’d been days since she watched it. How many times could people see such terrible things over and over again? There had to be something else. And there, in a row of photographs of men, all dark, all young, was him; for a moment she couldn’t remember his name—Mike, no, Bassam. And he looked at her as he’d first looked at her, like he had important things to do but first he had to make time for this, just this.

  Then there was the blue sky and the tall sunlit buildings and it was clear who the others were and she punched the Off button and threw the remote to the couch.

  There was his face as he stared between Retro’s legs, his lips parted, his eyes dark and almost fearful. There were his fingers on her. On her scar from Franny. There was his cigarette smoke and all his money, and her face burned and she stood quickly and rushed into the kitchen. She just stood there.

  Jean was probably napping, but April wanted to go wake her and tell her. But Jean’s face, her eyes that no longer bore into her with such judgment, and now April didn’t want to tell her. She didn’t want to tell anyone.

  Late that afternoon, when Franny was down in Jean’s garden helping her aim and spray the hose, Louis called from the club. His voice was thick and raspy. He told her he’d just given her name to the FBI, that they were talking to anyone who’d had anything to do with any of them. “And you had one of them in the Champagne, didn’t you, Spring?”