Muhammad Abi Samra - Beirut Noir

She put the pictures back in the drawer and went into the living room. She opened the window and leaned against it. The roar of the powerful electric generators reached her. This feeling of exhaustion returned: an exhaustion of bygone years, a delicious exhaustion which gripped her when Mousa, Philippe’s friend, came for an unexpected visit. She started to feel her sadness passionately because he came to offer her comfort. She sat on the sofa, listening to his pleasant words, stealing looks at his childlike hands and his sturdy neck.

She recalled the day when the three of them — Lamia and Philippe and Mousa — were together and Mousa offered his hand to help her cross over a pool of water, then he turned toward Lamia and said, practically in a whisper, “I can see that the two of you will no longer be together, from now on.”

A painful sweetness emanated from him. He started showering her with calls in the afternoon and their conversations would stretch out long into the evening. She left the cover of the sofa where he’d been sitting crumpled up in the same position for days. It made her happy to think about his presence there in front of her as permanent. She’d sip what remained in his cup, after he left, as though it were a kiss. Once, she was standing in front of the window and he called to her from the stairs, smiling. His smile made her understand that she’d replaced one love with another. If only she were able to delete those evenings from all the memories of her life, when she’d lean out the window and see his broad feet climbing the stairs to visit her without warning. He’d sit on the sofa and start laughing his sweet laugh, continuing his story about Prince Myshkin. His fluttering eyelids melted her. Each flutter was some kind of colorful bird that she’d approach only to have it fly off, away from her, to parts unknown.

What was it in his voice that made her loneliness dissipate, bringing joy to her heart and removing it from its labyrinth? His gentleness entranced her in the beginning. Then ever so slowly he started assailing her with dark thunderbolts. What did he want from her? Nothing, he told her, adding that he didn’t get involved in the lives of women who he has affairs with. Sometimes he’d call her and ask her strange questions, like the number of times her ex-lover had sex with her. Why did he even care about that? His questions perplexed her: What did he want? For her to announce her love for him? Would that be enough? Did he want an intimate friendship? She awoke from her daydreams panicked by the ringing telephone. Farid’s voice surprised her, drowning her thoughts of Mousa, “Darling, I’ll be a little late.”

She opened one of the unsent letters to Mousa she had kept, as though to complement the miserable pleasures that her life kept from her.

You don’t want to influence the lives of the women who you have affairs with? That’s fine. This sentence is enough for me to not want to see your face again. You know something? I turned that sentence over in my head thousands of times and didn’t consider asking you what you really meant by it. You don’t know the dark thoughts that invaded me and made me dead inside. As soon as I would try to get close to you, you’d let me know that there wasn’t any benefit for me in being in your life, freely offering hints, marked by pain, almost as though you were completing the thought to yourself: Or in anyone’s life.

Should I have endured your dark thunderbolts, vagueness, and forgetfulness?

Did I learn anything else from you? Are you truly able to leave me in peace?

I feel like a sad, raging bull, ready to fight, but the stabs it’s receiving on all sides have made it feel hollow.

I feel truly exhausted. Nothingness is the most exhausting thing.

She put the letter in an envelope. She decided to finally send it by post. She passed her tongue over the sticky line. It tasted bitter. No, she won’t send it. If only Salma were here to take care of this. She’d know how to, like she used to do in the past.

“Salma, why did you throw away all the letters I wrote to Philippe?”

“Because I believed this was the only way to avenge you.”

“But you made me believe that he had no feelings...”

“And he doesn’t... My husband has no feelings either. I’m going to arrange another meeting with that film producer.”

“I won’t destroy myself like you did. It’ll be an open marriage like we agreed it would be: step by step.”

“But won’t you wait a little bit until you can stand on your own two feet?”

“I won’t wait. This isn’t the first time he’s betrayed me with random women whom he’s found along the way. Carrying on like this you’re harming your children.”

“Spare me the sermon. Even you, Lamia, didn’t you say that you would’ve loved Philippe until the end of time, that you would’ve waited for him for a hundred years? Even after he sold you out for the cheapest possible price?”

“But he didn’t sell me out. He had to pull back because Crazy Samir the militiaman would’ve killed him. Samir sent me a letter that said, If you open your door to him one more time, I’ll push him right through the gates of hell.”

“You know what? Today I can’t even believe this whole story... How did Samir know that Philippe had been coming over to your place?”

“He was definitely spying on the house.”

“So he would spend all day and night guarding the entrances to the street? Who knows, perhaps a mutual friend told Samir what time your dear beloved would come. Believe me... there was a mutual friend. Perhaps Philippe was happy about this development and seized the opportunity to flee, using the party thugs as an excuse — something beyond his own desire or free will.”

“But who was restraining him? Holding his freedom hostage? Who was blocking him?”

“You portrayed him as an exemplary person, tormented and honest, you only ever spoke about his sincerity. He didn’t remain sincere, though. Why didn’t he stand up for you?”

“With those murderous beasts after him?”

“They only wanted to frighten him...”

“He had a right to be scared — I would have done the same thing had I been in his position... He is free!”

“Of course he’s free, but the problem is that he shackled you with your feelings... He didn’t end things there but instead distorted your view of life and men. This shriveled you up — you! Someone who had been full of life and brimming with confidence. You started your life with the wrong person and this ruined everything.”

“And you...? Aren’t you doing the same as I did? Then surely what you’re saying isn’t true, and at least I knew love.”

“In my opinion, all you knew was stubbornness, sadness, and loneliness that got you nowhere... Yes, he was very sincere! The whole time you used to talk to us about how he didn’t want to be tied down to any one woman, and then, all of a sudden, he was engaged. Then he got married with everyone there watching — all of his friends and ours too... He’s worse than my husband, taking everything he could and not giving anything at all. After all these years, I charge him with having planned this all with a mutual friend of his and Samir’s, encouraging Samir to threaten him so he could run away like the wind.”

“Could someone really plan to act so despicably? What are you ranting on about? It seems to me that your husband’s cheating has made you delirious!”

“But with clear vision. Never make justifications — of any kind — for a man. And Philippe’s the one being charged here.”

“Wow, the girl’s gone mad!”

“No, I’m not mad. Only I can no longer trust anyone, not even you, who deluded us into believing you were unique, suffering, tortured — but no more than two years had passed when... Didn’t you fall in love with his friend Mousa? Did you think I didn’t know? Why didn’t you try to marry him?”