“You don’t like them?” he asked.
“I do,” I said, “but not from this tree.”
I went to the cupboards and opened the doors. Everything was in its place just the way father used to have it. There were many bags of ground lotus leaves, but only a few camphor bags. I guessed that was why Hammoudy had gone to Shorja, but there was enough to last for the next few days. The white towels and shrouds were in their place, but the shrouds were packed in nylon bags and had supplications printed on them. There was plenty of cotton and bars of the olive colored soap, whose scent filled my nostrils. The pots and buckets were all neatly stacked.
I opened the faucet and the water gurgled, then came out in a rush. I stood at the washing bench and ran my fingers along its edges. It was as cold as the bodies that lie on it. I looked at my fingertips and saw the dust. I asked Mahdi to sweep the place. He went to the storage room to get the broom. I went to the side room. Everything was the same. The chairs, table, and the painting of Imam Ali right there next to the window. He had a yellow halo around his head with its green headdress. His eyebrows rose a bit and his brown eyes were darkened with kohl. The hair of his moustache and beard was wavy, and he was wearing a white shirt.
To the right of Imam Ali was a black-and-white photograph of Father, which Hammoudy must have put up. I asked my mother later where he had gotten the photograph and she said that he had asked for one to enlarge, but she had forgotten to tell me. In the photograph, Father had half a smile on his face and wore a white shirt with an open collar. I said to him: “Here I am, back at the place you wanted me to inherit. I am taking your place, just as you took your father’s. But I am warning you, father, I will not be here for long.”
I heard the broom scraping the floor and a few minutes later dust particles found their way to my nose. I sat on the chair and looked at Imam Ali’s picture again. I heard the voice of Muzaffar al-Nawwab clamoring in one of his poems where he addresses Ali: “If you were to return now, your followers would fight against you and call you a Communist.”
I took from my pocket the notebook in which, one summer many years ago, I had written down everything about washing bodies. Its pages had yellowed, but the cover was still intact. Sketches of my father’s face and his worry beads and Imam Ali’s face and the faces of other people filled the pages and framed the notes I’d taken. Those notes were now older than Mahdi. I read one of them. “Before washing, we say ‘I wash this corpse of this dead man as a duty and to seek God’s favor.’ During washing we must repeat: ‘Forgiveness, O Lord,’ or ‘O Lord, this is the body … etc.”’ I had written every little detail down in this notebook. Washing wasn’t difficult or complicated. I had watched my father do it hundreds of times and had helped him.
Mahdi finished cleaning and asked what he should do next. I asked him to close the windows and doors, because it was getting cold, and to go to the women’s mghaysil and get us some lotus and camphor just in case. He came back and stored the stuff in the cupboards, then stood at the door. I invited him to sit down. He took off his jacket and put it on the back of the chair. I wanted to get to know him better and asked him about his hobbies.
He said he loved soccer and played whenever he had a chance and that he wanted to be a professional player in the future.
“Why not?” I said and smiled. I pointed to his Barcelona jersey and asked whether he wanted to play for them.
“Yes,” he said excitedly.
“What about Iraqi teams?”
“I am a Talaba fan.”
I had stopped following the league, but told him that I was a diehard Zawra’ fan. “What position do you like to play?”
“Striker.”
Before we could chat any more, death knocked on the door. Mahdi got up and went to open it. My heart raced and I stayed in the chair for a few seconds. I heard Mahdi saying, “Yes, it’s here.” I got up, went and stood by the bench, then went to the corridor. Mahdi came back, followed by three men carrying a sheet hiding the dead man. Mahdi pointed to the washing bench and they laid the body there. He then pointed to me and told them, “Ustadh Jawad is the washer.” The sentence had a strange effect on my ears. As if Mahdi had decreed what I would be doing.
“My condolences,” I said. “What is he to you?”
“My nephew. My sister’s son.”
“May God have mercy on his soul. Can I see the death certificate?”
He asked one of the younger men with him to get it from the car. Mahdi started to fill the buckets with water. The man asked about the fees. I spontaneously repeated what my father used to say: “Whatever you can manage, plus the cost of the shroud, but later. The coffin is donated by the endowment, but we will deal with this later.”
“Fine,” he said.
I asked them to take a seat. The third man did so, but the deceased’s uncle stood still. The young man came back and handed the death certificate to the uncle, who gave it to me with some hesitation. I looked at it. “Full Name: Jasim Muhammad ‘Alwan. Sex: Male. DOB: 8-5-1982. Cause: Poisoning. Drug overdose/pills.”
I handed it back to him without a word. The dead man was only twenty-four and had died before his life had even started. Drugs had become rampant, especially among young men and teenagers. The young man who brought the death certificate went and sat on the visitors’ bench next to the other one.
I approached the washing bench and remembered that I had to take off my shoes and that I hadn’t brought slippers from home. I was a bit flustered. I went to the side room and took off my shoes and socks. I put my socks inside the shoes and hid them under the chair. I could feel how cold the floor was. I rolled up my sleeves and went back to the washing room and headed to the faucet. The water was bitterly cold. I washed my hands and arms with soap and dried them with a towel Mahdi had prepared.
I stood to the right of the bench and removed the sheet from the dead man’s face and body. He was naked except for white underpants. His skin was yellowish. He had short brown hair, a wide forehead, and a pointed nose. There was a mole on his right cheek next to his moustache. His lips were dry and looked thirsty. He had scattered patches of hair on his chest between the nipples. They narrowed to a line trailing down his belly. He was wire-thin. His bones and ribs were visible. I put my arm under his neck to lift him and pull the sheet from under his body. I got goose bumps.
I rested his head on the bench again. Mahdi put his hands under the dead man’s knees to lift the rest of his body. I pulled away the remainder of the sheet and gave it to Mahdi, who folded it and handed it to the uncle. Mahdi brought me another white towel and handed it to me. He held a pair of scissors in his other hand. I put the towel over the man’s waist and took the scissors from Mahdi. I lifted the towel a bit without showing anything and started to cut away his underwear from the side. I went around and did the same to the other side. I removed the underwear and gave it to Mahdi, who put it in a plastic bag he had brought and gave it to the uncle. I returned the scissors to Mahdi and then placed the palms of my hands on the dead man’s belly and rubbed gently. It felt like hard plastic. I filled a bowl with water and poured some on his face. I inserted my index finger into his mouth and rubbed his teeth. Mahdi had started mixing in the ground lotus, which formed a foam and spread a pleasant smell. I poured another bowl of water over the man’s head and washed his face. I looked at Mahdi and realized it was time to turn him on his side. We did so as I repeated, “Forgiveness, O Lord.” I washed his right side from the head all the way down to the toes and repeated the same thing on his left side. Then we washed him again with water and camphor and then a third time with pure water.