Her last Wednesday.
13
Her last two days. Windows in red and blue flew towards her. They got bigger and clearer as they came close to the surface of the computer screen and then passed away. She had stopped changing Arabic into English, stopped typing; and the words had flickered and disappeared into the blackness from where the flying windows now came. From infinity, specks at first and then vibrant checks and greens.
She thought, the day after tomorrow I shall insha’ Allah be on the train, Coach D, seat number 16F and by this time in the afternoon the train would have long left Scotland.
She was alone in the room because Diane had gone to her weekly Research Methods class. It was as if her presence had kept Sammar working and now she could not concentrate. She stood up and walked around. The room was small, just enough space for the two desks, two swivel chairs, Diane’s Guardian on the floor. She looked out of the window at the parked cars, three students crossing the road, a dark freezing sky. In a few days, on another continent, sunshine all the time.
Tomorrow’s goodbye weighed on her, so that now as she sat down again at the desk, she considered ways of avoiding it, bypassing the awkward words, the little silences in between. In the past when she had imagined leaving this city she had seen herself easily slipping away, casually, with nothing left behind. Now everything was murky and at times she almost forgot why she was leaving. Then she would remember Amir and feel guilty that she rarely thought of him, never dreamt of him. She was far from what her aunt wanted her to be, the child was not the focus of her life, not the centre where once his father had been.
She had no premonition about the knock on the door but she saw the sadness that came in with him. As if it were smoke, as if it had colours. Colours of ivory and mauve, faintly corrosive. Rae sat on Diane’s chair. He said, ‘I’m going away tomorrow,’ and she became confused because she was the one who was going away, her bags were packed, her tickets crisp and new, and she became confused because this was term time and he had classes running, Fareed visiting for a few weeks.
‘Do you remember I spoke to you about my uncle in Stirling?’
She nodded. She remembered him in the nursing home, the elder brother of David, who had gone to Egypt and never came back.
‘He passed away…’
‘Oh I’m sorry.’
Rae looked at the ghostly windows that blew on the computer screen. There was no tragedy in this death. But still the force of death was with them in the room, clean, irreversible. The enemy of continuity had sliced their lives today. But in this defeat there was something comforting, something soft…
He sat with his elbows on his knees and talked about how he had found out, the details of his uncle’s last hours, the funeral ahead. And because endings inspire a looking-back, a summary, she listened to the outline of a completed life, a career, memories from a summer holiday.
He said, ‘I wanted to be with you tomorrow before you left.’
‘It doesn’t matter.’ The smoke in the room stung her eyes. This was the goodbye then, this was the goodbye she had thought she could avoid. It had come a day early.
‘It matters very much. I’m so sorry.’
‘Are you going to drive?’ A voice with tears was not attractive. She should not talk in such an ugly voice.
‘Yes, I’ll drive.’
‘Are you well enough to drive?’
‘I’ll be alright, I promise. I would hate myself if I didn’t go.’
More than anything else in the world, now, she wanted to go with him to Stirling. It took her by surprise, how irrational and childish she could be. How she could want something that wasn’t feasible, wasn’t right at all? But she could not push the want away. More than anything else, she wanted now to leave the university, the prison of its familiar buildings, its familiar routine. She wanted to leave Aberdeen, get away from where she had been ill and sleepy for so long. They would drive south towards a city she had never been to before. They would stop on the way for petrol and from the shop he would get her mineral water and sweets.
When she spoke her voice was falsely light, wanting him to know that she was aware it could not happen, that it was frivolous, to be dismissed by common sense, dispersed with humour. ‘I wish I could come with you.’
‘I wish you could, it would make all the difference.’
Because he was not humouring her, because he was not surprised, she had no resistance. The sudden darkness when she covered her face with her hands, his voice and feeling his arms around her. This was what she had feared all along, that everything under the surface would converge and break. It was closer than she had imagined, prickly and sudden, noisy sobbing, messy because of her runny nose. He said he loved her, he said things that made her cry more not less. She told him that and lifted her head from his shoulder, breathed. He said sorry and held her hands, said she had beautiful hands. His hands were too warm, a little clammy, unnaturally warm as if he was not well, as if he was ill. She had not known that he was like that. She had not known this about him and now she felt sorry for him, closer to him. It was a closeness that soothed her, made her stop crying. She looked down at their fingers entwined, the difference between them and how smooth and cool her skin was.
The footsteps came like a dream. She heard them first and moved away from him, pushed her chair back. She saw the room change, shift into what it had been before: harsh neon light, paper filled, bathed in the low hum of the computer. Diane’s familiar voice as she pushed open the door, ‘Got some Chewies…’, then she stopped at the unprecedented sight of her supervisor in her room, sitting on her chair. The surprise took away her usual confidence and standing before them holding her folders and books, she looked young and untidy, her cheeks red from walking in the cold.
‘Hello,’ said Sammar, trying to smooth out the guilt from her voice. She searched Diane’s face for signs, afraid she would find suspicion. Rae was frowning, his eyes saying, ‘What are you doing here?’ He had forgotten that Diane too belonged to this room.
‘Is it very cold outside?’ Sammar asked, anything to say. Diane mumbled something about snow. The absence of a third chair meant that she stood near the door, hovering, not knowing what to do.
By that time Rae’s frown had changed to understanding. He had for Diane a calm greeting, a question, ‘How are you getting on with the literature review? I haven’t seen anything from you lately.’
Diane mumbled that it was coming along. She was behind in her thesis and had been since the beginning of the term avoiding him. For her sake and so that the awkwardness in the room would end, Sammar wished that he would go away.
He did leave, without having explained his presence and she had to face Diane’s annoyed, ‘What was he doing here?’
While Sammar put together a reply about urgent work he needed her to do before going away, Diane dumped her books on the desk and started to empty her pockets. She reclaimed her chair, was herself again, mimicking Rae’s voice, ‘I haven’t seen anything from you lately.’ The information that he was going to Stirling caught her interest. ‘That’s the second time this term he gets someone to take over his classes!’ she said and handed Sammar a piece of chewing gum.