Ahmed Khalifa - Imagining Liberty - Volume 1

I hailed a cab and we zigzagged our way through downtown Cairo with the precision of a drunken mule. I’d forgotten where the apartment was and I described it as best I could to the driver. It took us three unsuccessful attempts before we finally got the right house. I let myself in, got the mattress as clean as I could and collapsed with only boxers to hide my modesty.

We found ourselves in Tahrir again the next day and I prayed my thanks that we did because it was the day the dictator fell and the day the sun and I became one.

The day did not begin as the one before it had. This time I was the weight on Youssef’s chest, although I decided to forego the honey experiment. I shook him awake and he was dressed in seconds.

“Do you think it’s okay leaving him here?” I asked, motioning to the still form of Benjamin on the floor. “He’ll probably wake up, right? He’s been out for hours.”

“If he comes to, he’ll find his way home,” Youssef said. “He’s got everything he needs here if he wants to wait it out. We can’t miss Tahrir today. Today’s speech day!”

He was not wrong. We stood amidst our brethren and listened to a buffoon of a president make speech after speech, alternately promising us the world or denouncing us as traitors to the state. He welcomed us all as his children then sicced his followers on us on air. Both Youssef and I had our Flails around our waists in case of trouble but I had not heard from Omar since the previous day. Ismail was absent as well, though this was markedly less surprising. It didn’t matter. Youssef and I, we were protected by a human tidal wave.

I felt a tap on my shoulder and turned to face the sun. She flashed a shy smile and I did the math, wondering how she’d found me in a crowd of millions. The numbers fled my head as we embraced. There was no welt on her face, and she seemed to act like the previous night had not happened. I took the hint and joined the cover-up, anything to see her keep smiling. I glanced around as I hugged her, worried he was nearby. He was not. Her skin was hot to the touch and I noted with more than a little satisfaction that the hug she gave Youssef did not last nearly as long. She introduced us to the friends she was with and they were each imprinted onto my mind because one does not forget who one was with then Morsi was felled like an oak tree.

The inevitable proclamation came and cheers rippled through the crowd like waves. Slow at first, they reached a crescendo and both Sabah and I were tossed off our feet and into the seething mass to be heaved from one man to the next, rag dolls. We rode the world’s biggest trampoline for some time, and then I begged the crowd to let us down in between snorts of laughter.

I excused myself from the group a few minutes later and she followed, as I had hoped she would. We walked under cover of darkness, through throngs of campers, taking the widest loop we could around our little band of revolutionaries. We held hands and I noticed for the first time that the leather jacket she wore was had tiny birds embroidered on the cuffs. A rich crimson, with shiny orange plumage that caught the light. Phoenixes. I told her she was corny for choosing a red bird as her spirit animal. She told me I was jealous of her immortality. We walked again and I looped an arm around her waist and drew her close. She told me I was forward. I told her I loved her. I hadn’t intended to, but she was my sun. The words formed themselves and fought their way out. She told me she knew. She told me she loved me too. We neared our friends and had to disengage, physically at least. My eyes followed the glinting phoenixes as she loped ahead. Youssef saw me approach and winked theatrically. I was still giddy from her last words and paradoxically, I couldn’t stand to be around her much longer. I wanted to preserve the image of her, the willowy leather woman with the bright red hair, telling me she loved me for as long as possible. To do this, I had to leave her here, for now.

I said it was time for me to depart, to a chorus of groans. Youssef said he’d join me, and the group wished us all the best. We hadn’t seen the last of them, they promised. We laughed at their wit and bid them farewell.

“What a bunch of tools,” Youssef said as we threaded our way through the crowds.

“They’re good people you judgmental ape,” I replied, grabbing an ear of roast corn off the tray of a nearby vendor and leaving him a pound in its place. I tore into it like I was mad at it.

A cab was found and in short order, we were back at the houseboat. We made our way to the balcony and found a pleasant surprise- the gleaming shisha , freshly assembled and waiting only for a coal. Amm Attia came in with a basket of them a few moments later, his smile broad.

“Time to estebeh, time to wake up,” he told us conspiratorially as he placed the lit coals on its head. We laughed- an honest one this time- and asked him to join us.

“Heaven forbid, men,” he said as he held the hose out to Youssef. “I’ve never touched the stuff. Nothing that impairs your mental state, that’s what God says. But please, don’t let me make you uncomfortable.”

Youssef took the hose and inhaled with a passion. The smoke that emerged wrapped around my face like a veil and I suppressed a cough. We thanked Amm Attia and he retired to his post outside. Soon enough we were giddy, giggling like schoolgirls at the patterns that appeared on the walls and dripped like slime to the floors, coating them in hexagons.

I told Youssef about Sabah, and what she’d said. He wished me well, from the bottom of his heart, but worried about Ismail. I told him not to worry. I’d keep her safe. I’d make him see reason. I’d fight for it and I’d marry her.

“That’s not the way they do things,” he said, and he didn’t need to tell me who they were. “To them you’re an infidel. A traitor. A foreign double agent. It doesn’t matter how little sense it makes.”

“You talk about him like he’s beyond saving,” I shot back. “He’s our friend. He has been since we were children. You were right, he’s changed, but he’s been brainwashed.”

“He slapped her right across the face, in front of all of us,” Youssef said quietly. “He didn’t care who saw. Can you tell me you felt he was worth saving then?”

I looked away and sought solace in more hash. I needed more, to stave off this attack of reason and rationality. I didn’t need logical. I needed dreamy and the hash obliged. We sank back in our cushions and watched the ceiling melt away.

A faint groaning came from within and we both leapt to our feet, having momentarily forgotten our unconscious Anne Frank five feet away.

We learned more of Benjamin that night, much more. He’d scurried to his feet like a rabbit that senses the fox closing in, but we’d managed to calm him down. It was our English, I think, that finally reassured him. We fetched him his own pillow and passed him the shisha , hoping it would loosen him up. He adjusted the bandage around his nose, winced, and accepted the proffered hose. He smoked like a pro.

He was, in fact, a Jew. His mother was Israeli, his father English. He told us he’d always loved Egypt. He’d studied it in history class when he was a child and found it fascinating. When he became a photojournalist he’d traveled a lot and covered a lot. Infant mortality in China. Modern-day slavery in Mauritius. He’d even been on Gordon Ramsay’s crew covering shark-fin trading in Costa Rica. But once he’d found the job at the Daily News, he never took another international job.

“I never wanted to leave,” he explained. “It was all so overpowering. The country is majestic and the people have the biggest hearts in the world. ”