As Though She Were Sleeping (4 page)

That’s Faisal, said Mansour, pointing to the slight figure at the center.

Did he spend his honeymoon in Shtoura, too? asked the driver sarcastically.

You don’t understand anything about anything, said Mansour. Soon we can name our little boy Faisal, he said, looking into his wife’s eyes. How would you like that?

She did not answer. She had thought Mansour would name his first son Shukri, after his own father. I don’t know, she said finally.

And what do you think of the idea? Mansour asked the driver, who rubbed his hands in front of the stove and shoved them into his trouser pockets as if to hide away the warmth they retained.

What’s this blasted cold, what a bitch. Your luck, fellow.

The driver glanced at Milia, who stood next to her husband beneath the photograph of the king of Syria, who had been thrown out by the army of the
République Française
, whereupon the English had founded another kingdom for him next door in Iraq. He has all the luck, your husband, the driver said, and collapsed onto a little sofa nearby.

The hotel owner reappeared followed closely by two women, both equally short. The first one was very pale and gave the impression of being half blind. She looked to be in her sixties. The second one had wheat-colored skin and seemed about thirty years old but otherwise they looked as alike as twins.

Wadiia, take the bride and groom to Room Ten, said Khawaja George.

The two women moved docilely as if they were a single person, coming toward the driver.
Yallah
, hurry up, bridegroom, said the first Wadiia, while the eyes of the second Wadiia looked them over, her eyebrows knitted in puzzlement. Which one is the groom? she asked.

It’s this one, this one, said Wadiia I, pointing at the driver slumped into the sofa who was half asleep by this time.

Me – I’m the groom, said Mansour.

Pardon me, sir, I thought he was the groom because that’s what grooms are always like – ugly and old and bald. And they take the prettiest girls up to the rooms,
ya husrati
, we poor women! said Wadiia I.

Wadiia, shut up! said the hotel owner, yawning.

That’s the groom, I knew him right away, said Wadiia II, the darker one, and she grabbed Mansour by the arm to lead him to the room.

And me? asked the driver.

Just who are you? asked Wadiia I.

I’m Hanna Araman, he said.

Pleased to meet you – but still, who are you?

He’s the chauffeur who drove us here and he needs to be taken care of, said Mansour.

Wadiia I looked at Wadiia II and then at Khawaja George Massabki, who muttered, Room Six. Light the stove in Room Six. He turned to the married couple and wished them a good night.

Khawaja George bent over the stove, put out the flame, and disappeared through a door at the far end of the reception hall. The three guests followed the two women up a long staircase and were delivered to facing rooms.

Wadiia II opened the door to the first room and beckoned to the newlyweds while Wadiia I stood chatting in a low voice to the driver at the door to Room Six.

Milia entered the spacious room and the first thing she saw was a very large bed. A mirror took up almost the whole of the facing wall. A square table sat in the middle of the room, draped in an orange tablecloth on which sat a bottle of champagne, two large rounds of thin flaky bread, and a plate holding little squares of white cheese. The bathroom was to the left of the bed; the stove close to the table was lit. Mansour locked the door. Milia could still hear the murmurs of the driver and the elder Wadiia, and she could hear their loud cackling as well.

Milia would not retain a clear memory of what happened in that room. She saw Mansour taking off his coat and hanging it behind the door. She saw him walk over to the table, saw him work the cork in the bottle of champagne until it popped and the white foam spilled over into the two glasses he poured. He gave his bride a glass and raised his own.

To you, my bride!

Milia took a sip. She swallowed the white beads floating on the surface of her glass and felt a light dizziness swell up suddenly from her belly. She put the glass down on the table and said she wanted hot tea. But Mansour appeared not to have heard her. He took a bite of cheese on bread and prepared a morsel for his bride. She pushed his hand away and said she was not hungry, so he swallowed it whole. He drank the glass he had poured for himself in one gulp and poured another, and strange phantomlike shapes began to form in his eyes. Milia smiled, remembering her mother’s words about the foolishness that afflicts a man on his wedding night.

The man took her by the hand and led her to the bed. She felt her throat dry up. This was the moment one knew was coming, and she must be brave.

They sat on the edge of the bed. Mansour rested his head against her neck and then kissed it. A light shiver went through the body of the young newly married woman and she wanted to lie down. She leaned back a little and saw herself flying, engulfed in Mansour’s arms. Now he would pick her up in his arms and fly with her, before setting her down on the bed again and taking her.

Milia leaned back on the bed and waited. The kisses moved away from her neck. The man seemed to be trembling hard. She wanted to hug him close to make this moment easier for him. But he jumped up and began to take off his clothes. That was the last thing Milia had expected. A groom standing in the center of the room taking off his clothes and tossing them onto the floor? His face was contorted as though he wore a mask and the hair on his shoulders and chest grew so thick and black that it seemed to form a second skin.

Now he will pounce on me, Milia thought. He will capture and open me. The most peculiar sensation came over her. She had the feeling she was standing on a very high terrace waiting for someone to come, someone
she knew would throw her from this height, and yet she was resigned to the wait. She closed her eyes on the image of a terrifying fall and a pair of hands reaching to throw her down on the bed and strip off her dress before tearing off her underclothes.

The wait went on and on. Drowsiness closed in on her. She leaned back on her right elbow and something like a light and fitful sleep crept over her. The fog of the road began to rise and spread inside her eyes. She shook herself and opened her eyes. Now she did not see Mansour standing naked in the middle of the room. The man had disappeared. She saw his crumpled clothes strewn on the floor and remembered the sight of him trying to pull off his things. His trousers had caught on his shoes, the shirt had twisted around his neck, and his socks seemed to be stuck to his feet. She saw his thick black moustache trembling over his lower lip, and the expectant smile returned to her lips. Then she heard something like a faint moan. She realized it was coming from the bathroom. The groaning grew louder and there were sounds of vomiting and retching. But instead of going to the bathroom to see what had befallen her husband, she lay down on the bed and covered herself in the sheet without taking off her dress.

Honeymoon,
hunh
? Milia raised her voice, believing the bridegroom sitting on the commode in the bathroom would hear her. When he did not answer she was afraid. The image of the man swallowed up by the fog high on Dahr el-Baydar appeared to her, shivering as he ran to the car making sounds like a puppy’s yelps overtaken by groans. He opened the car door and sat down next to the driver, trembling and panting. Milia got out of bed. When she went over to the stove she saw that the flame was dying. She added some kindling and waited for the flame to leap. She walked closer to the bathroom door and called to him. Still Mansour did not answer. She knocked on the door several times. She heard only a faint moaning, muffled as though it came from far away. The warmth from the rekindled fire spread across her body and she wanted to take off her dress. She stooped over the
suitcase, pulled out her long blue nightgown, and put it on. She heard the man calling for her and she went to the bathroom door.

Open up for me, Mansour, it’s Milia.

But the voice calling her had become even fainter, as if whispering. Was he calling for Milia or for Mama?

For God’s sake, open the door.

Lower your voice, the driver will hear you, the man said, his voice hoarse now.

Do you want us to get a doctor?

Calm down, please! Just calm down.

His words stopped abruptly and his moans sounded even odder now. Milia was certain the man was going to die and she sank to the floor in front of the door, kneeling there and rapping on it, over and over. She grasped the doorknob as if she would use it to scale the door. She heard Mansour calling for his mother, but in a whisper. She begged him to open the door and she listened to the rattling sounds of his retching. She crouched there, feeling alone and completely helpless, for she could think of nothing to do.

I’m going to go down and ask the owner to send for the nearest doctor.

Lower your voice, the driver’ll hear us, he must be laughing at us.

Mansour’s voice seemed to be coming from the bottom of a deep well as he told his wife she must not leave the room. There was nothing at all to worry about.

Go on to bed and I’ll be there soon.

She did not know how she got to her feet, or went over to lie down on the bed, or pulled the covers over her and went to sleep.

And why is she naked now? And why are these tremors coming over her like blows to her body?

Milia decided to open her eyes because she sensed death. She knew that death comes only as a long dream with no ending. Death is a dream, she said to her brother Musa. Come on, look at your grandmama, see how
she’s always dreaming. The grandmother lay flat on her bed in a muddle of white sheets and the women sat all around. There was only a faint sound of weeping; no one dared wail out loud for Malakeh Shalhoub when she closed her eyes and passed on. Their grandmother had never liked crying over the dead. When the dead are finished dying, there’s no need for anyone to weep! This was what Malakeh screamed at the waiting women when her daughter died. That day after darkness fell, people heard the voice. It was her husband, Nakhleh, howling like an ox under slaughter. Later, rumors would go around the neighborhood that the man died – only two weeks after the death of his daughter – from the pain caused by having to suppress so many tears. His wife had forbidden him to weep over his daughter Salma.

Milia did not tell her brother Musa she had seen her aunt Salma in her dream. Musa was only three then. He could not understand such things.

The night before her aunt’s death Milia opened her eyes at the sound of her mother’s wailing. She decided to return to her dream where she might save her dying aunt, who was only twenty years old. But even there, Milia’s aunt would not emerge from her profound sleep; she would not open her eyes. The dream was a puzzling one. Milia understood its meaning only years later when she began to menstruate and dreamed that she was flying.

When Milia related the dream to her grandmother everything was already over. The elderly woman held back her tears and requested the little girl to tell the others what had happened in her dream. That day Milia learned to speak about the cryptic, perplexing images she saw at night. As she spoke her cheeks would darken to red and her tongue would show in the gap made by her absent front baby teeth. She could not say a single letter without lisping. She told them how she had seen her aunt Salma falling into the pond in the garden and thrashing about amidst a multitude of tiny red fish as she called out frantically for help. In the dream, Milia tossed a rope
to her aunt and Salma grabbed it. She tried to get out of the water but the rope slipped from Milia’s hands.

Her aunt lies on thick tufts of grass. Milia walks over and tries to awaken her but just then she hears her grandmother’s voice: Don’t wake her up, my dear, leave her to dream! That was the moment when Milia woke up, shaking with fear. As soon as she went back to sleep, it seemed, she heard her mother’s screams, leapt up from her bed in alarm, and understood that her aunt Salma had died.

Actually, Milia was not telling the truth. She lied to everyone, but it was only because she was afraid to tell them the rest of her dream. She was afraid to reveal to them that she had entered her aunt’s sleep space. She had dreamed her aunt’s dream. Who would believe that anyone could enter the sleep-visions of another human being? Milia herself had not taken in fully what had happened; she would not understand what it meant to enter someone else’s sleep space until the moment of her own death. Only then did she see what no one ever sees; and she divulged it only to the infant who entered the world from her body.

Milia lies down next to her aunt on the grass. A filmy white mantle coats Salma’s closed eyes. Milia can see herself entering that filmy cloud and then she sees her aunt flying over what looks like a remote and bottomless valley. She hears the heartbeat of the woman who sails across the sky and she sees fear in her eyes. Salma wears a wedding dress; a long white veil ripples and flutters behind her. Suddenly the veil plummets into the round basin below in the garden and rain comes down in sheets. Milia tries to catch up with Aunt Salma but she cannot. Running toward her aunt, she trips and falls. Blood oozes from her right knee. She looks upward and sees Salma drawing farther away until she is no more than a white dot on the horizon. Milia hears her mother crying. She opens her eyes and sees Saadeh huddled in the corner of the room, sobbing. She knows that death has arrived. She
understands that death is an unending dream, as her grandmother would say. At the age of seven it dawns on her that she can steal into the sleep-vision of death and savor the watery taste of it.