Lifted by the Great Nothing: A Novel (21 page)

The women looked at each other. The serious one said, “Ah, there. You see? Very easy. We must call AUB. They will have records.”

Jamila was thrilled, lightly popping up on her toes. They brought him a phone and dialed the number for the American University. He was transferred to the registrar’s office, where an older man with a high-pitched voice answered,
“Allô, marhaba.”

“Hello, my name is Max. Do you speak English?”

“Yes, of course. I am speaking English right now. We are the American University. We must speak English. What can I be of assistance about now?”

“I’m looking for someone who used to go there named Samira Jabbir.”

“Yes?”

“Yes.”

“It does sound familiar.”

“Really?”

“Oh, yes, very much.”

“Wow. Great.”

“Okay, yes. But I don’t think she is here now. Okay?”

Max sensed the old man was about to hang up. “No, no, wait. I don’t think she works there or anything—she was a student at AUB a long time ago. She’s my mother.”

“Your mother?
Habibi
, you don’t know where is your mother?”

“Yes. I mean, no—I don’t know her at all.”

“Repeat her name, please?”

“Her name is Samira Jabbir.”

“Samira Jabbir. Ah, yes. It is really very familiar again.” The line went silent for a good ten seconds. “Yes, I think I remember her more now. Jabbir, you say? Samira?”

“Yes.”

“Ah, yes. I am remembering a little more still.”

Another ten seconds elapsed. “Well, do you have any system of finding her?”

“Yes,” the man said extremely slowly, clearly not responding to Max’s question but to one of his own thoughts or recollections. “If it is who I think it is, she came here years before to find out more about another student. A very interesting woman.”

“Okay.” Max couldn’t think of how to confirm whether they were talking about the same person. “Is there a way to look her up?”

“A man named Rasheed.”

“Sorry?”

“That was the student she looked for. I believe.”

“Oh my God. Yes, that’s got to be her!”

“Good. Very good then.”

Too much time passed. “Well, what next, sir? I mean, would you be able to find her file? I’m trying to get in contact with her.”

“Yes”—again, suspiciously slowly—“are you far from the university? You come here. I will find her file, and you come here, okay?”

The serious woman said they were a five-minute walk from AUB’s campus. “Yes,” he said to the old man, “I can come right over.” It truly frightened Max how uncomplicatedly this seemed to be working itself out. It felt like an omen that it would precisely not, in the end, work itself out.

The man said, “Very good. You will come to the second floor of the College Hall building and ask for Faraj in room two four five. This is me. Okay? Faraj.”

“Okay, Faraj, room two four five, got it. See you in five minutes.” But the man had hung up before Max finished his sentence.

The serious woman introduced herself as Rima and said she’d walk him to the university. As they left the hotel, he couldn’t resist vocalizing his doubts. “I’m not sure about this. That guy seemed a little out of it.”

“What is the risk of going to see if he can help? Getting your hopes up? You must already have hopes if you came all this way, no?”

“Probably.”

“Probably? No, definitely. But I wouldn’t worry too much. This is a very small country. Somebody always knows somebody who you are looking for. Every time. What would be strange to me is if you did not find your mother by the end of today. And if not today, then tomorrow or the day after or the day after that.”

To himself, Max mumbled, “Or the day after that.”

Rima moved quickly, her heels clapping different levels of sidewalk, unfazed by its patchiness, and fearlessly walking through traffic. Max’s stomach had settled, but his body remained weak. He had trouble keeping his back straight and desperately wanted to lie down again. The prospect of gaining on his mother wouldn’t allow for that. This abstract idea of Mother had been with him the whole trip over here, like a belt fastened around his chest, restricting his lungs. What would having a mother mean? Would she be the answer to everything that had been unclear or lacking? The idea of her became increasingly central; a promise of completeness. The counterweight to his father. Rasheed’s lies had made Max’s whole life feel untrue. Any sweet memories would be forever embittered by the dishonesty. She would fix that. Though he had to acknowledge the possibility of having false information about her. She
might live somewhere else entirely now, she might even be dead. But he knew he’d find something here, something that would bring him closer to understanding whatever he needed to do next.

Max kept thinking he saw Rasheed out of the corner of his eye. They rambled past groups of men smoking and reading the paper, doctors walking hurriedly toward the hospital in lab coats, women in business suits and head scarves, others in full-on chadors. There was a mother begging on the sidewalk, pretending to nurse a boy who must have been eight years old, and a man yelling at himself as he turned in circles, who Max swore at first was his father. They walked by old bullet-and shrapnel-riddled facades of buildings, one splayed open like an organ for dissection, exposing broken pipes and wires, with two adjacent walls intact. They passed by old homes with Ottoman arches and French windows next to abandoned buildings and a block away from brand-new high-rises spiraling into the sky and reflecting so much light they seared Max just for looking at them. More cars and motorcycles flew by, and the disproportionate wetness and fumes in the air bent the light into waves, like burning oil. They entered the AUB campus with a nod to the security guards, stepping into this oasis in the middle of the oppressive city. It had lush grass quads, adobe buildings, smooth walkways, tennis courts, ancient banyan trees; expensively coiffed students looking like TV personalities with backpacks; palm trees, benches, and cats. Emaciated cats everywhere, lounging about like entitled Sahara lions.

Rima led him into College Hall, arcades and palm trees at the entrance, and up to the second floor, into the open room 245. There was one man whose body hid behind towers of boxes and folders on his desk. He appeared to be only a head—a bald, hoary, white head shaped like an upturned Styrofoam cup—with gold glasses. Max presumed he was seated back there, but
the man walked around the desk and showed his tininess. He couldn’t have been more than four foot eight. He smiled graciously at Max and Rima as he closed the door behind them.

“Hello, sir,” Max said. “Are you Faraj?”

“No, I am very sorry. I am not.” Though he sounded exactly like him.

“Do you know where I may find him?”

“Faraj?” He shook his head. “I do not know him.”

“No one named Faraj works here?” asked Max.

“No. I am very sorry. There is no Faraj here.” He dug his hands into his pockets.

“You know everyone who works in this building?”

“Yes, of course. I have worked here since I was young like you.”

Max turned to Rima and then back to the man. “This is College Hall, right? Room two forty-five?”

“Yes, yes, it is.” The tiny man wrinkled his forehead, preparing with extreme keenness for whatever the next question might be.

“I swear I heard him say this building, College Hall. Room two forty-five.” Max paced back and forth, not knowing what to do next.

Finally the man offered, “I am Faraz? My name is Faraz?”

Max stopped his pacing and stared down at this man’s oddly shaped head. “Did you just talk to someone ten minutes ago who was looking for his mother?”

“I did, yes. Who, may I ask, is wanting to know?”

“That was me.”

“Ah! Yes! Hello, welcome. I am Faraz, not Faraj.” He took Max’s hand as if he was forgiving him.

Rima showed little patience for this man. She spoke sternly at him in Arabic, surely reiterating the situation. Faraz’s ghost-white face loosened and jumped and pinched as he listened, his
mouth opening and closing like a nutcracker soldier, as if afflicted with absorbing a hundred times the stimulation of a normal person, registering everything going on around him at once with miserable attentiveness.

“Yes.” He turned to Max. “And I have already looked her up. When I saw her file, I remembered much more. I even found some notes I wrote down on the file all those years ago, because we kept a little bit of special track of her. She was involved in many forms of activism on campus, very invested in politics, and the arts too, but mostly politics. She was a very determined and energetic young lady, even when pregnant. I recall it now. The dean used to check her grades and so on to make sure she was not a troublemaker, but her marks were perfect across the board. Professors talked about her. Yes, yes, the professors were afraid of her because she was capable to point out their mistakes in the classroom!” He bent over to slap at his thigh and give a hooting laugh. “But then of course she was expelled.”

Hard to decide how reliable this man was. “Why was she expelled?”

“Op.” Faraz glanced over at Rima. “For her involvement with some of the outside groups. But I remember before this that she carried her baby everywhere. She even brought the baby to her classes sometimes, and people said this baby never cried or made a noise during the lectures. We even wondered if the baby was really alive at all! How old are you?”

“Seventeen.”

“Unless you have a twin brother, it was you who was the baby who did not cry!” He hooted again. “She was one of these very nice girls who did not want people to know she was nice. Very serious and in too much of a hurry to stop being young. I was very sorry to learn all that she suffered through.”

“Like what? What did she suffer through?”

“Op.” He looked at Rima again for guidance. “She spent some time in a bad prison for her political involvement. A very strong woman. Yes.”

Max braced himself with a held breath. “Do you know if she’s alive now?”

“I have no way of knowing at this present moment, but I don’t see why not.”

“You said over the phone that she’d come looking for someone here a few years back.”

“Yes, that’s right. She came here some years ago, looking for a man.” He moved some papers around on his desk arbitrarily. “No, I didn’t write his surname down, but I remember his name was Rasheed. I don’t know many Rasheeds, and I like this name. So I remembered it right here.” He pointed at his own head. “But I remember also that I couldn’t really help her. We didn’t have any information about where Rasheed so-and-so lives now.”

Rima cut in, “Faraz, can you help this boy find his mother or not?”

His face clenched in concentration and then broke free of itself. “Yes, yes, of course. I can help in many ways. I can tell you the year she graduated, her birth date, the address she had while she was studying here, and—Op!—maybe the phone numbers of some of her classmates who I believe still live in Beirut and who might know better where is she currently. How is that?”

Exhale. Faraz spent the next few minutes writing down information taken off his computer while humming the tune of “Lean on Me.” Then he called two classmates he thought he remembered seeing Samira with, and who still lived in Beirut. He learned through the first phone call that one had died the year before of lung cancer. The second phone call was to a woman who explained that Samira’s sister was back in Beirut
and would probably be of most help. Her name was Anika. Faraz jotted down the number, called, and after an ecstatic minute-long conversation in Arabic he hung up and told Max he was to go to his aunt’s house right away.

“My aunt’s?”

“Op!” he laughed. “Another surprise for you!”

Rima said to Max, “This is Beirut. Every day another aunt you never knew appears in front of you.” She handed him her card and said she had to get back to her hotel, but that he was welcome to stay there later. Also, she had plenty more hummus if he wanted. She had a dour but sincere kindness that Max hadn’t ever encountered. He was sad to see her go.

The heat and pollution attacked again. Every other person they passed on the way to Anika’s stopped to shake Faraz’s hand and ask about his wife, and his children and grandchildren, and his brothers and sisters and aunts and uncles. It took about twenty minutes to walk the three hundred yards to Anika’s. This place, Beirut, felt like an elaborate movie set. Just as soon as Max had that thought, he realized it was the exact opposite. No, Beirut made Clarence feel like a movie set. This, here, was real life. Every missing tooth, every red-haired Arab, every American-looking kid, each set of gorgeous eyes, each tennis bag, every beggar, every shiny necklace, every ficus or orange tree, was new and rousing and rich with meaning to him now. The meaning being no more specific than: The world is big, small, unfair, and sometimes beautiful.

Anika lived in the building noted as Samira’s address in the AUB database, al-Nada building.

She buzzed Faraz and Max in and they rode the elevator to the eleventh floor: the penthouse apartment. The suspense of that ride bordered on intolerable. A black maid with a broad forehead and the compact physique of a jockey opened the door. She guided Faraz and Max across a spacious, marble-floored living room with Persian rugs. Glum black-and-gray paintings of ships in awesome storms hung on the walls next to dozens of photographs of men shaking hands like politicians. The antique furniture looked uninviting and bumpy, and if it hadn’t been for all the sunlight flooding the apartment, thanks to the screen door leading to the terrace, the place would have felt haunted. As they reached the balcony’s edge and admired the sea for a moment, Anika descended the stairs from the roof deck.

“Faraz, Hakeem, welcome,” she said. Max almost corrected her when she called him Hakeem. She wore an all-white linen suit with a light blue headscarf resting on her head, her auburn-dyed hair exposed in the front. She looked about forty-five, had intelligent brown eyes, the pale, powdery olive complexion that rich Middle Easterners sometimes have, and walked with the slow privilege and elegance of a feline, every movement easy and deliberate. She gripped Max by the shoulders, her long, hard nails like little splinters. “The spitting image of your father,” she said in an almost accusatory tone. She bent down to kiss Faraz on both cheeks and invited them to sit around the table under the patio umbrellas. Faraz and Anika caught up in a mixture of French, Arabic, and English. They talked for an excruciatingly long five minutes with no apparent reference as to why Max sat with them. Anxious as this made him, it gave him a chance to examine his aunt’s face and way of speaking without the self-consciousness of being part of the conversation. Her hands moved delicately as spiders. He wondered if his mother looked and gestured similarly. There was something in her demeanor he
didn’t trust. Was it something vicious, or was she just guarded? Her eyes hardly ever changed; her mouth smiled and frowned, opened and closed, but the skin around her eyes never creased. They talked about where Anika had been all these years, how her husband and children were doing in Qatar, what had come of AUB, the shortcomings of bureaucracy, the wonderful professors and the doddering ones who’d been there since Anika’s day. In English they spoke with the same accent as Rasheed, only Anika’s grammar and vocabulary were better. The maid came to ask Max and Faraz what they’d like to drink.