I found her inside the school near the door, with a girl and a boy, schoolmates. She was not crying, and bore none of the signs of fear I had expected. I kissed her, and she said, smiling, “Mama, you’re late!”
“I’m sorry, Maryam, I’m sorry. Were you afraid?”
“I wasn’t afraid. My friend Farah was afraid and cried. She said that two weeks ago a car bomb exploded near their house, and that one of their neighbors died in the explosion. She said that the same thing might have happened to her mother, and began to cry. Samir and I kept her occupied by talking to her, and it worked.”
I looked at the little girl. She was younger than Maryam, thin and delicate. She was laughing now, talking with the boy. I said, “When we’re a little late, assume that it’s because of the traffic, or because a guest has appeared suddenly and made us late, or that the clock is broken.”
I kept the children occupied until the boy’s mother and the girl’s sister arrived, and everyone left safely.
Maryam asked, “Mama, why were you late?”
“Uncle Abed visited me. He’s going to Amman. They closed the Research Center.”
“Who closed it?”
“The army.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s a Palestinian Center.”
“Mama, why does the army hate us?”
I changed the subject: “I’m going to buy you some chocolate because you didn’t cry when I was late, and because you helped your friend when she was afraid and cried.”
Maryam said, clinging to my hand and skipping, “Buy me chocolate because I like it. I’m not so little that I cry when you’re late — I have a mind that tells me, ‘Maryam, don’t be afraid now. Wait, and if Mama doesn’t come before night, then there’s a problem, because it can’t get dark before Mama comes.’ And it was only natural to take care of Farah, because the older one helps the younger — the teacher told us that. I’m two years older than she is, because I’m seven and she’s five.”
She emphasized the age by spreading out the fingers of her left hand and the thumb and forefinger of her right, and then folding the two fingers and leaving the five.
“But you didn’t answer me — why does the army hate us so much?”
“Because all their leaders are from the Phalange, and the president is also from them.”
“Why do the Phalange hate us?”
“That’s a long story, I’ll explain it to you later. Are you hungry? Today I made you …”
“You said that Uncle Abed is going to Amman. Is he going to live there?”
“Yes.”
“And my brother Abed, is he going too?”
“I don’t know. He hasn’t said.”
“If he goes we won’t have any relatives in Beirut. Will we go too?”
“If we went, who would you miss most in Beirut?”
“First, Umm Ali. Second, my teacher and my friends at school. Third, the thyme-flavored snacks that Umm Nabil makes, in the camp. And Umm Nabil and her children. Fourth, Dr. Hana in the Maqasid Hospital — maybe I’ll be a doctor like her when I grow up, and like Papa, of course. Papa’s been away a long time, Mama. I mean, they kidnapped him, where? When we play in the camp we find the boy who’s hiding, we always find him. Maybe we need to look more.”
I changed the subject again. “Sadiq says to come and visit him in Abu Dhabi. What do you think?”
“Vacation is coming in a week and we can visit him. But we’ll come back before the beginning of school.”
“What if he said, ‘Stay here with me’?”
“It’s better to visit him for a month or two and then come back to our house. Would Abed come with us?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“He has his studies and his own concerns.”
“I would rather he come with us, or that we stay with him.”
I go back and forth to the camp. I encourage someone’s mother, or one of her neighbors, because her son has disappeared or because the army has arrested her husband. I read the Safir newspaper to the elderly ladies who can’t read. I help to prepare the list of those kidnapped, I take part in small parades of women (the time of large demonstrations has passed), organized by the Women’s Union for the Families of the Kidnapped. I take part in helping someone’s mother and her eight children, when she has no one to support her and no work and her house has been destroyed. I look for some connection or I arrange the necessary sum to free one of the young men. I contribute to reopening the nursery schools that have been destroyed, to help the women who go to work because they have been widowed in the war or the massacre or because their husband left with the fighters. I take care of the children of one of my acquaintances who has gone to Ain al-Helwa to check on her family, or to take a message, or to bring her sisters’ embroidery to sell in Beirut, so she can send them the money to help them through financial difficulties. I take Maryam to school and then I go to the camp; I stay there until her school day ends and I go back to take her home. Sometimes if I need to go to the camp in the afternoon, I leave Maryam with Umm Ali, or I take her with me, and she plays with her friends there.
33
Abed’s Detention
Abed didn’t come home for three nights. I was somewhat concerned; I thought he’s with his colleagues here or there. A momentary anxiety assails me: what if he’s infiltrated the south? He has infiltrated before, and I didn’t know about it until after he returned. I chase away the anxiety; there’s nothing new in his being away from home for a night or two. On the fifth day the anxiety grips me; it’s no longer anxiety but certainty, something bad has happened to him. Has he been kidnapped? Have they killed him at one of the barriers? I jump out of bed and look at my watch: the hands show two in the morning. I have to wait until daybreak, and then make arrangements. How will I do that, where will I start? By visiting those I know among his friends in Beirut? By going to the Popular Committee in the camp? To an official of the organization? Where will I find an official in the organization? Why haven’t I done that before? For sure you’ve become feeble-minded, Ruqayya—“Delusions,” you say, what delusions, when kidnapping happens every day and killing young men is routine? Where did you get this foolish calm, from apathy or stupidity? I get up to boil a pot of coffee; it boils over. I wipe up what has spilled on the stove and wash the pot, filling it with water and adding the coffee gradually. I watch the pot carefully, waiting for the coffee to boil, concentrating my attention on it so it won’t boil over. I lift the pot from the fire with care — and my hand suddenly shakes, spilling the pot and everything in it on the floor and on my clothes. God help me! I throw the pot in the sink and bring a rag to clean the floor. I change my nightgown, wash the pot and fill it with water. I sit in the living room sipping the coffee and smoking. Abed might be with a group of his friends, dividing his time as usual between his studies and his political work, distracted from us, forgetting to come home. That has happened before. I calm myself by recalling this day and that, when he stayed away and then returned, until my imagination concludes that he is safe, and that my concern is only unfounded anxiety. Then it jumps in the opposite direction — have they taken him? Kidnapped him? Beaten him? Maybe they’ve killed him, what would I do then?
After the dawn prayer I knocked on Umm Ali’s door. She did not open, so I knew that she was still praying. I waited at the door and knocked again after a few minutes, and heard her heavy steps coming to the door. She asked who it was, and I said “Ruqayya.” She opened the door and said, “Good morning.” I said, “Abed hasn’t come home for five days, maybe they’ve kidnapped him.” She asked me to sit down and then made me a cup of coffee. She suggested that I visit the houses of his friends first, saying, “I’ll take Maryam to school and you go to them right away, before they leave for work. If you don’t find him with any of them, we’ll begin looking for him.”