Ali Ansari had tried to meet Eric Bloom, the young developer who was trying to restore the building to its former glory. Once upon a time the building had been home to the richest Philadelphians. Then it got bought by Father Divine of the Universal Peace Mission Movement. Also known as Jealous Divine, he had been a black religious reformer who married a white woman at a time when such things were shunned. Even though he advocated extreme modesty between genders and celibacy within marriage, he made the move to desegregate the building and set up a public kitchen where people from the community — of all races, of all classes — could come and eat inexpensive meals. This was in the forties. At the time it was perhaps the only mixed-race high-end hotel in America. Though Father Divine died in 1965 his followers continued to live in the building until just a few years ago, when they were forced to sell and disappeared into North Philadelphia.
We stopped admiring the Divine Lorraine and went into the deli to eat. A sign on the door read, Proudly Serving Halal Food Since 2000. The zeroes were in the shape of crescents and carried stars in their arms. I leaned inside and the smell of shawarma and cheese fries bowled me back. There was a dark-skinned man standing in a stained yellow wifebeater with his hand on his hip and a remote control pointed at the high-definition TV hanging on the wall. There was a young white guy at reception with a hammer and screwdriver tattooed on his wrist. There were a number of young men sitting around, chatting with one another, betting on a soccer match. There was a smaller TV in the corner of the deli, dusty and unused.
Ali greeted the server: “Hey, Chris. You know I saw you with GCM in Northern Liberties the other day.”
Chris gave a knowing smile. “I’m all about lust,” he whispered and gave Ali a pat on the back.
When he went off to fill our order I asked Ali Ansari what GCM stood for. But he played it coy, saying I would find out when I was ready. This made me believe that perhaps it was some kind of code that queer guys used. GCM could stand for Gay Cute Male, perhaps. The possibility that the interest Ali Ansari and I had in each other might have to do with something other than our shared status as Muslims left me annoyed. I didn’t want him to turn out to have been interested in me because of something physical. Not that it wasn’t flattering; it just wasn’t useful. America had no shortage of sex. What it lacked was communion.
We discussed some of the marketing campaigns that Brother Hatim and Sister Saba had tried to create. Ali flipped through the files on his phone. The first was an image of three Muslim children — one boy in a skullcup, one girl in a hijab, and one rather androgynous child, all of whom had eaten too much candy and appeared to be on the verge of throwing up. Above them it said, Axis of Upheaval, and below them was the information for the events being held during Islamic Awareness Week, which overlapped with Halloween week. The second ad featured a woman in a full black robe and face covering. Above her it said, My Latest Design. And below her it said, Check out my website and find out what I’m wearing underneath. The URL that was listed took people to Temple MSA’s Islamic Awareness page. The third and final ad featured a criminal standing at a gun dealer’s shop trying to buy a weapon, only to have his card declined, with the scary-looking store owner telling the thwarted man, Payment declined. Your card is sharia-compliant. It played on the idea that under Islamic law investing in firearms was illegal.
“You’re right,” I said. “Their propaganda needs work. The first one is too blatant. The second one is too slutty. The third one is too subtle. You should look at the adverts that the atheists are putting out.”
“What a world we’re in. In which even atheists proselytize.”
“It’s called commodification. Everyone has to do it.”
“I only know how to commodify my penis.”
“Well, start with your penis,” I said. “How would you craft a marketing strategy for it? Then apply those principles to marketing Islam.”
He laughed. A sincere and unabashed laugh. The laugh of a perverse man who considered laughing nothing more than the necessary consequence of feeling complete disregard for the opinions of the world. It was the same laugh that Richard Konigsberg had possessed. It became apparent to me that there was no sexual tension between us. If anything, we had a kind of complementary intimacy where our personalities, each missing something ineffable, indescribable, seemed to overlap in some middle space where we could both feel strong, masculine, more capable of throwing our fists against the skies that fell upon us. That might be what they called friendship. “That is hard to do,” he said. “My penis is so much bigger than Islam.”
We continued ribbing each other and finished our meal. We were just about to pay when the door opened and a customer made her way to the counter where Chris was working. I heard her ordering a shish taouk and did a double take because I recognized the voice.
I could hardly believe that the person before me was Candace. She looked radically different. She wore a gray headscarf tied stylishly around her face in layers, with its little sequined edge falling to the side. Her mascara was parrot green. It matched the nail polish on her hand. Her head was titled just a little to the left like there was someone there inquiring about her. She looked elegant, exotic, edgy. Like she was a model in an Islamic couture magazine. Perhaps it was the audacity of adopting a foreign fashion, but her face seemed to be filled with a greater, deeper vulnerability. I hadn’t been this tugged by the magnetism of a face since I’d watched Isabelle Adjani in a film.
I told Ali Ansari to wait and got up to say hi to her.
“Is that really you?” I patted her on the shoulder.
She turned. Her face had a shocked expression. “I never thought I’d run into you at this place.”
I spread my hands and gestured at Ali Ansari. “A friend brought me here.”
She waved at Ali and paid for her order. “I’m really glad he did.”
“I thought you lived in Center City. What are you doing up here?”
“Well, I only lived in Center City to be near Plutus and because I could afford it. But when I quit it wasn’t important living there and I needed someplace cheap.”
“You quit Plutus?”
“They were shuffling their staff in an unreasonable way. I just didn’t agree with that.”
“You should have reached out,” I blurted.
She blushed a little. Her lips puckered and returned to flatness. “I figured you had your support system.”
I bit down on my tongue. Was her remark an attempt to make me confess that I would have liked to have stayed in touch? I wasn’t sure if I wanted to give her such a direct confirmation of my need. Even with things the way they were with Marie-Anne, I hadn’t yet abandoned my caution around other women. Nor could I remove from my mind the night Marie-Anne and I had used Candace as part of our scenario. In a strange way it meant that Candace belonged to Marie-Anne.
“I guess I did.”
“Good,” she said. “I’m glad you did.”
I glanced back at Ali, who was waiting expectantly. I didn’t know whether to take Candace over to him or not.
Candace caught my uncertainty and decided she had made enough of an effort to connect. “So. I should go.”