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

married. When the talk turned to the bridal settlement and the jewelry, my beloved stretched out her beautiful, delicate hand, adjusted the bonnet, which had slipped a little, and said to my mother in her magical, dulcet voice that the sum of twenty thousand pounds wasn’t nearly enough, and spoke of young women related to her whose settlements had reached as much as sixty or even seventy thousand. Then she ended by saying, politely but firmly, that she couldn’t possibly accept less than thirty.

And I nudged my mother eagerly to agree.

Izzat Amin Iskandar

IZZAT AMIN ISKANDAR was my classmate in First Preparatory. He was on the short side, his body strong and broad, his head large, his hair black and smooth. He wore glasses, along with a slight meek smile, almost of supplication, and that Coptic look—sometimes shifty, misgiving, and frightened, sometimes profound, submissive, and burdened with guilt and distress. He also had an artificial leg and a crutch. The crutch ended in a piece of rubber that prevented it from making a noise or slipping, and his artificial leg he covered with his school pants and a sock and shoe to make it look normal.

Each morning Izzat limped into the classroom leaning on his crutch, dragging his artificial leg and swinging from one side to the other with every step until he reached the end of his bench. There, in the corner next to the window, he would sit down and lay his crutch on the ground, paying it no further attention. He would completely absorb himself in the lesson, writing down carefully everything that the teacher said, listening alertly and knitting his brow in concentration and then raising his hand with a question—as though by becoming so involved in the lesson he could insinuate himself into the throng, hide himself in our midst, and become, for a few hours, just one student among the others, stigmatized by neither crutch nor limp.

When the bell sounded for break, the moment its splendid tones rang out, the students would all cheer for joy, throw down whatever they were holding, and push and shove their way, sometimes even knocking one another over, to the door of the classroom, from where they descended to the playground. Only Izzat Amin Iskandar would receive the sound as though it was the fulfillment of some ancient, awaited prophecy, close his exercise book, bend quietly down, and then take the sandwich and the comic from his bag and spend the break seated where he was, reading and eating. If any of the other students were to look at him and show any curiosity or pity, Izzat would smile broadly while continuing to read, to make it clear how much he was enjoying himself, as though it was the pleasure of reading and that alone that kept him from going down to the playground.

It was the first time I’d taken my bike to school. It was a Thursday afternoon and the playground was empty of all but a few students playing soccer on the far side. I started riding my bike. I would cross the playground back and forth, making circles round the trees, imagining myself in a bike race and yelling at the top of my lungs, “Ladies and gentlemen, and now for the World Cycling Championship!” In my mind’s eye, I could see the public, the important people, and the riders with whom I was competing and hear the shouts and whistles of the fans. I was always in first place, reaching the finishing line before the others and receiving bunches of flowers and kisses of congratulation.

I continued to play like this for some time and then suddenly I got a feeling that I was being observed. I turned and saw Izzat Amin Iskandar sitting on the laboratory steps. He’d been watching me from the beginning and when our eyes met he smiled and waved, so I set off toward him and he started his standing up process, leaning on one hand against the wall of the steps and grasping his crutch under his arm; then he raised his body slowly until he was upright and came down the steps one by one. When he reached me, he started examining the bicycle closely. He took hold of the handle bar, rang the bell a number of times, and then bent and ran his fingers over the spokes of the front wheel, muttering in a low voice, “Nice bike.”

I was quick to say with pride, “It’s a Raleigh 24, racing wheels, three-speed.”

He gave the bike another look over, as though to test the truth of what I’d said, then asked, “Do you know how to ride with your hands in the air?”

I nodded and set off on the bike. I was an expert rider and happy to show off in front of him. I pedaled hard until I got to top speed and could feel the bike shaking beneath me. Then I raised my hands carefully from the handlebar, until my arms were straight up in the air. I stayed that way for a bit, then turned, and came back to where he’d taken a few steps forward to the middle of the playground. Coming to a halt in front of him, I said as I got off, “Happy now?”

He didn’t answer me, but bent his head and started looking at the bike as though weighing something profound and surprising in his mind. He struck the ground with his crutch and moved forward a step until he was up against the bike. Then he grasped the handlebar in his hand, bent toward me, and whispered, “Let me have a ride, please” and went on insistently repeating, “Please, please.”

I didn’t take in what he was saying and stared at him. At that moment he looked like someone swept by a wave of such longing that he couldn’t stop himself or go back, and when he found I didn’t reply he started shaking the handle bar violently and shouting,