Friendly Fire, Alaa Aswany [10 ebook reader .TXT] 📗

eyes for a second. A sense of foreboding that could not be stilled took possession of her and she came to be dominated by a single idea—that she must drive death away at any price, escape the looming grasp, and live. I read once that when an elephant feels it is going to die, it walks to the place it has chosen to be its grave. There the elephant stops and calmly awaits its end. What nobler thing is there than to be brave and never snap? I was my mother’s only son and she loved me, I know; and I also know that if she were to choose between my death and her total cure, she would choose my death, unhesitatingly—and let it sadden her afterward as it might, so long as she was safe and sound.

My mother’s terror of death left her with no concern to spare for anything else. When my uncle Abbas came to visit us, she would go to even greater lengths to show off her weakness and powerlessness. She would make up to him, passionately praying to God on his behalf that He increase his wealth and preserve his children. She would caress his chest with her hands in false affection and yell angrily into my face—since what then could be my worth?—that I’d left the window open and the cold air might do my uncle harm. When he got up to leave, my mother would burst into tears and tell him that she was afraid all the nagging by ‘the bastards’ (meaning his wife) would one day harden his heart against her. At this my uncle would smile, bend over and kiss her brow, produce from his pocket the envelope of money that he had got ready beforehand, and then whisper to her anxiously as he thrust the envelope under her pillow, “Whatever happens, please don’t say anything to my wife Hikmat about my coming to see you because you know she’s getting old and bad tempered and I don’t need more problems.”

I was having sex with the maid Huda. Desire would gnaw at me, playing such havoc with my nerves that I would forget the smell of sweat emanating from her body, her thick, coarse hands, and her ugly, brown, cracked toenails. I’d call her and she’d know what I wanted from my tone of voice and come to my room, closing the door behind her and waiting in silence without looking at me. I’d pounce and put my arms around her and everything would happen quickly and without a word. I’d be desperate to get it over with and when we were finished, she’d slip out of my grasp and gather up her clothes, leaving me feeling empty inside as the details of the encounter sank in, stripped of the clamor of pleasure, so that I felt the same disgust that I had felt during my college days when my hand touched the sticky, slime-covered belly of a frog, and I would try to rid myself of it with a hot shower.

At the beginning of our relationship, I used to make sure that my mother was asleep before calling Huda to my room. After a while, I no longer bothered. My mother knew what was going on and didn’t care or, at the least, didn’t dare to object because she needed Huda constantly. Huda it was who fed her, washed her body, changed her clothes, went with her to the toilet, and had learned by heart the times for all her different medications.

After a session with Huda, I’d go out and find my mother sitting in bed, all eyes. She’d always open a conversation or ask a question designed to reject the notion that she had any idea of what had just happened in my room. When sometimes I complained to my mother that Huda was neglecting my things and hint that I was thinking of getting rid of her, she’d look at me with terrified eyes and say, “Never mind! I’ll send her today to clean your room.”

I was certain that what she meant was that she’d send her to me to have sex with. My mother couldn’t imagine her life without Huda, and the thought that anyone might make her mad enough to leave the house terrified her. She would have liked her to leave everything else and sit by her all day and all night. She trembled with fright at the idea that one day she might need Huda and not find her, and when Huda was obliged to neglect her to take care of her baby girl, Kawsar—when she went to feed or change her—I could feel my mother’s terrible resentment at the situation. Once Kawsar got sick and had a high temperature so I gave Huda ten pounds to take her to the doctor but my mother objected and made out that it wasn’t important, insisting that children often got fevers that went away on their own without treatment and without doing any harm. Huda was almost convinced that there was no point in going to the doctor and wouldn’t have done so if I hadn’t insisted. When in the end Huda left with her daughter and my mother and I were alone together, she scolded me for insisting. I answered her that children needed care and that the fever could be a symptom of a serious illness. My mother was silent for a moment and put her finger in her mouth (a habit she’d acquired along with her illness); then she looked at me with a terrified and evil expression on her face and whispered, “Just think, Isam! If our Lord were to rid Huda of that girl of hers, she’d really be free to look after me.”

I muttered something in disavowal, not believing my ears, but my mother turned her face as far away from me as she could, made a gesture with her hand, and said as though making light of it,