It was eighties night at Deals, and “Tainted Love” was playing to a full, smoky house—so smoky that he had to squint to see the far walls of the pub, checkered with framed pictures. With watery-eyed effort, he spotted a familiar face. Maribeth, who worked in the visa section, was at a table by the wall, drinking with a tall Egyptian man he didn’t know. She was wearing a shorter hairstyle and a new sleeveless dress that showed off her admirable biceps.
He stared for too long, and she met his eyes, smiling, waving him over. He skirted through the crowd, nodding at faces he knew, shaking the hand of someone he didn’t remember at all, and when he reached the table Maribeth kissed his cheeks. She was from Tennessee, and cheek-kisses were her favorite part of living outside the United States. They had also slept together twice in the last month, so the kisses lingered a little longer. Then she pushed him away and motioned at her friend. “Meet David Malek.”
John shook his hand. The Egyptian was maybe forty, weary eyes but youthful cheeks, and had a strong grip. He worked out.
Maribeth said, “David is a novelist.”
“Really? You don’t look like one.”
David grinned with overt modesty, as if being a novelist were something to be proud of. “First one comes out in the fall.” John had been wrong—that accent was All-American.
He sat next to Maribeth. “What kind?”
David cupped his ear.
“Genre?” John said.
“Thriller. Called Desperate Intentions.” When he saw the look on John’s face, he added, “Publisher’s idea. That wasn’t my title.”
“What was your title?”
David hesitated, a faint smile flickering around his lips, and said, “Stumbler.”
“I’m not sure I like that one any better.”
Maribeth poked him in the ribs. “Don’t be an ass.” To David: “John’s an anachronism. He reads poetry.”
“You must be the last one,” said David, smiling, unconcerned by John’s assessment of his title, maybe even pleased by it.
“You researching a new one?” John asked.
“About the revolution,” David said.
As John offered good luck, Maribeth’s hand settled on his thigh. He leaned back and stretched an arm across the back of her chair. Was that a flash of disappointment in David Malek’s face? John said, “What’s your main character going to be? Egyptian?”
David scratched at his ear, grimacing. “Don’t know if I could pull that off. An American, probably.”
“A novelist?”
“Ha!” David said, slapping the table, fully recovered now. “No, that’s best avoided, too. Maybe someone at the embassy? Maribeth tells me you work there, too.”
John wondered what else Maribeth had told him. He’d never admitted to his real function, but she’d certainly noticed, the last time he slept over, the work-related call he’d received in the middle of the night before rushing off. “I hope it’s someone more interesting than me,” John told him. “I just schedule travel for the important people.”
“Know any CIA?”
Maribeth turned to listen to this.
John opened his free hand to the ceiling. “Never one that would admit to it.”
Instead of deflating him, David seemed to take this as a challenge. He leaned closer. “But you know people who don’t admit to it.”
“Tell it from an Egyptian’s perspective,” John said. “Much more interesting.”
Maribeth let out a disagreeable grunt. “He wants to sell the book.”
John got up and ordered a round of drinks from the bar. He wasn’t particularly interested in the conversation, nor was he all that interested in Maribeth’s hand sliding along his upper thigh once he’d returned with three beers. Yet here he was, trying to forget about blood in the desert as he drank his beer in great gulps and nodded at David Malek’s unself-conscious praise of the revolutions trembling through this part of the world. His optimism, John realized, wasn’t naive. Like Jibril’s, it was merely American, the belief that all anyone in the world wanted was to live in their own little America. Finally, John cut in. “You know, don’t you, that they’re going to vote in Islamist parties who have no time for the United States. Look at the history here: Nasser, Sadat, Mubarak. Failed wars, failed culture, and failed social policies enforced by a secret police. The Muslim Brotherhood has been taking care of the people for decades, far better than their governments ever have, and now it’s time for their reward.”
Innocently, David said, “And why not? It’s called democracy. You sound like Gadhafi.”
John frowned. “What?”
“The first volume of his magnum opus, The Green Book, is called ‘The Solution of the Problem of Democracy.’”
Green, thought John.
David said, “You think democracy is problematic. It is, of course, but that’s the way it goes. Either they’re democratic or they’re not.”
“Yeah,” said Maribeth. “We can’t give them only half democracy.”
“We’re not giving them anything,” said John, leaning forward. He was a big man, and he knew it. He also knew that a little physical intimidation tended to help his arguments. “If we’ve given them anything, we’ve given them thirty-odd years of authoritarianism by supporting their oppressors. Now, we act as if we’ve given them a new world because they’re using Twitter to talk to each other.”
“Look who’s the wet blanket,” Maribeth said. David was grinning wildly at his outburst. No one here was intimidated by him.
He looked away, scanning the crowd again, but his shadows hadn’t bothered following him inside. As he took another drink he had a flashback to his dream, opening up the trunk of that Tercel and finding his son and daughter inside. Danisha climbing out and telling him how tired she was. Jibril beckoning him into the street.
He knew, of course. A man who knows poetry knows how to read his own dreams. He had populated this one with people he’d let down, just as he knew he would eventually let down Maribeth, who was now squeezing his inner thigh. God sure didn’t make me very wise. He’d let down a lot of people during his time on earth—women, friends, and employers—and as Maribeth’s nails dug through his jeans he hoped that no one would be too surprised the next time he failed.
She squeezed harder, nails pinching. He nearly yelped.
5
When he woke around noon on Saturday, his head throbbing to the anguished melody of a call to prayer wafting in through an open window, he briefly had no idea where he was, nor where he had come from. He was not in his own bed. His pillow was damp, and there was a stink of acid that made him think that he’d vomited, but when he sat up, gripping his head, he found no traces. Then he recognized the disorganized room, the pastel colors, and the Mickey Mouse clock. From another room, he heard CNN playing on a television.
Maribeth appeared with a cup of coffee, wearing a long T-shirt, disheveled hair, a smile, and nothing else. “You look bad, John.” She handed over the cup. “You need this more than I do.”
“How much did I drink?”
“Everything they had. I’m starting to think maybe you have a problem.”
He did, but he didn’t think drinking was it. With his first sip of hot coffee he was overcome by the desire to urinate, and when he got up he noticed he was still wearing underwear. “Did we … ?”
A short laugh, then she shook her head. “You couldn’t have raised your voice by the time we got back here, much less that.”