Joel Rosenberg - The Twelfth Imam

Exhausted and still somewhat disoriented, Najjar left the hospital and saw a row of taxicabs waiting out front. The first driver in the line rolled down his window and shouted, “Where are you going? Can I help you?”

Najjar stumbled down the front steps and got into the backseat of the cab, only to realize he had no wallet on him and thus no money. Worse, before Najjar could say anything, the driver pulled into traffic and Najjar realized he had no idea where he was going, either.

“You look like you’ve seen an evil spirit,” the driver said, staring at him in the rearview mirror.

“Just watch the road,” Najjar said, more gruffly than he had intended.

“Where to?”

Najjar couldn’t think. He felt foggy, drugged. For the life of him, he couldn’t remember where he lived-what street, what building. Where was his wallet? Had someone stolen it? Had he just left it at the hospital? It had his ID. It had his only picture of his mother and father. It had…

Without instruction, the driver began heading east, across the Tigris River toward Sadr City, a district of nearly a million Shia Muslims.

Where are we going? Najjar wondered. How does the driver know where to take me?

Ten minutes later, the driver pulled up in front of an apartment building that looked familiar. As did the neighborhood. As did the people.

“Najjar? Is that you?”

Najjar instantly recognized the voice of his aunt, calling to him from across a courtyard.

She ran up, pulled him out of the cab, and kissed him on both cheeks in greeting. Then she paid the driver and, sensing that Najjar was not well, led him up to their apartment.

“Are you okay, Najjar? Why did you take a cab home from the university? Why didn’t you take the bus as usual?”

As they stepped onto the elevator and his aunt pushed the button for their floor, Najjar was struck with the oddest thought. How had that driver just gotten him home, when he himself had not remembered where he lived?

Najjar’s aunt tucked him into bed, and he slept for the entire afternoon.

U.S. Air Flight 3940

A storm was brewing at twenty-eight thousand feet over Lake Ontario.

“David, would you mind switching seats with me?”

Startled, David Shirazi opened his eyes and found himself staring into the face of Mr. Harper. Biting his lip to keep himself from saying something he shouldn’t, he peeled off his headphones.

“Say again?” he asked, trying to get his bearings.

“I’m sorry-I didn’t mean to disturb you,” the older man said with a genuineness that only annoyed David more. “It’s just that now that we’re at cruising altitude, I was wondering if I could sit with your father and catch up a little. Would you mind?”

Of course I would mind, David thought. You’re not even supposed to be here, and now you want my seat?

But David Shirazi loved his father far too much to say it. Indeed, he felt guilty for thinking it.

“Sure, Mr. Harper, no problem,” he mumbled.

Harper shook his head and chuckled as David unbuckled himself and stepped into the aisle. “You and your brothers are all taller than your father now, aren’t you?”

David nodded. He didn’t want to disrespect his father by being rude. But he certainly had no interest in small talk at the moment. He scanned the rear section of the Boeing 737, looking for somewhere else to sit and finding nothing. The flight was packed. The rain was picking up and through the windows he could see flashes of lightning crackling through the thick gray thunderheads all around them. Then the seat belt sign came on and the copilot warned them they were heading into some rough weather and should take their seats immediately.

“What seat were you in, Mr. Harper?” David finally asked as the man buckled up beside his father.

“Oh, right, sorry-23B,” Harper replied. “Right next to Marseille.”

Great.

David put his headphones on, hit Play, and made his way toward the rear of the packed jet, carefully gripping the seatbacks along the way as the turbulence picked up. He spotted Marseille. She was curled up against the window with a red airline blanket over her, wearing her own set of earphones. David was glad her eyes were closed. He wasn’t up for small talk with her, either. He quietly took the seat beside her and buckled himself in, careful not to make a sound that might wake her. It didn’t work. Marseille turned, rubbed her eyes, and smiled.

“Hey,” she said.

“Hey.”

She took off her headphones. “Sorry I didn’t say hi before,” she said. “I just got chatting with everyone else. Everyone’s been really nice.”

He shrugged. What was he supposed to say?

“First time?” she asked.

There was a long pause.

“What, in a plane?” he asked, incredulous.

“No, up to Quebec-on this whole fishing thing,” she replied.

He nodded.

“Me too,” she said, then added, “obviously.”

There was another awkward pause. Thunder clapped just outside their window, startling everyone.

“Quite a storm, huh?” she asked, her hands gripping the armrest.

“Yep.”

The two were quiet for a while, and David slowly began to relax. Then, out of nowhere, Marseille asked, “Hey, do you remember coming to our house for Thanksgiving, a long time ago?”

He actually did have some memories of the rainy weekend of board games and hide-and-seek at the Harpers’ small Cape Cod house in Spring Lake, along the Jersey Shore. He even remembered a picture of Mr. Harper and Marseille carving the turkey together, which he had seen in one of the dozens of photo albums his mother kept organized and labeled on a shelf in their living room in Syracuse. But he didn’t feel like admitting any of that now.

“Not really,” he said lamely.

Marseille got the message. “Six years is a long time, I guess,” she said quietly, then turned back to watch the lightning flashes out the window.

David watched her pull up the blanket and try to get comfortable. Then he felt a sudden pang of guilt. This poor girl was only trying to be nice, and he was acting like an idiot. For crying out loud, even the Mariano and Calveto brothers had been nicer to her. They’d had different motives, to be sure, but he’d been brought up better than this. It wasn’t Marseille’s fault she was here. David’s own father had invited them. The least he could do was be civil.

“Whatcha listening to?” he asked, putting his own music on pause and taking off his headphones.

She turned back, her eyebrows raised. “First you ignore me; now you’re suddenly interested in my music?”

“I’m just asking. Conversation. Small talk. They have that down in New Jersey, don’t they?”

Marseille studied him for a moment as if sizing up his sincerity or lack thereof. He took the moment to study her as well. She really was quite good-looking, a sort of girl-next-door beautiful, he decided. Her summer tan hadn’t yet faded. She wore no makeup or fingernail polish. She had a barely noticeable scar on her upper lip. But it was her eyes-big and warm and expressive-that really caught his attention.

“Okay, guess,” she said at last.

“Guess?”

“Sure,” she prodded. “You know, conjecture, consider, reckon, suppose-they know how to do that up there in central New York, don’t they?”

Caught off guard, David suddenly smiled a real smile. “Sometimes,” he conceded. “All right, let me see-Madonna?”

She shook her head.

“J. Lo?”

Marseille rolled her eyes. “Pleeease.”

“Hmm,” David said, “so I’m thinking Lady Marmalade is out too?”

“Ugh,” she replied. “Do I look like I would listen to Christina Aguilera?”