Alaa al-Aswany - The Automobile Club of Egypt

“Abd el-Barr is a decent man.”

“A decent man who is a drug addict and a wife beater!”

“By law, he is allowed to teach his wife manners.”

“I will not allow any human being to beat my sister, and I will not let her live with a drug addict.”

“It’s a load of rubbish!”

“And you’re only interested in yourself,” Kamel answered, looking defiant.

Said said nothing for a few moments and then took a different tack.

“Kamel, Saleha is my sister, and I love her as much as you do. I don’t want any harm to come to her, but please consider my situation. Abd el-Barr is my partner in the factory, and we are supposed to sign the contract in six months’ time. If I lose Abd el-Barr, it will be difficult for me to find another business partner. I’m just on a salary now, but the factory is my big chance, and we’ll all benefit from it.”

“So what do you expect from Saleha?” Kamel asked.

“Just to put up with Abd el-Barr until we’ve signed the contract, and then we can do what we think is right.”

“You want our sister to go and live with a drug addict until things work out for you? You really are vile.”

“Shut your mouth,” screamed Said as he gave Kamel a shove. He was thrown off-balance but then grabbed him by the sleeve. I threw myself between them as my mother screamed, “Enough! Shame on you both!”

We are all responsible for what happened to Saleha. Said presented her with Abd el-Barr and nagged her until she married him. My mother and I failed in our duty to protect her. Saleha trusts our opinion, and had I stuck to my objection to the marriage, that would have been the end of the matter. Why did she suddenly agree to it? Maybe her acquiescence irritated me so much that I simply gave up. Maybe my job, studies and work for the organization had used up all my energy. It now fell to me to get her a divorce. I could hardly believe Said’s selfishness, handing his sister over to an impotent drug addict just to get his contract signed. I had made up my mind to go and see Abd el-Barr that Wednesday, my day off, but in the end I could not wait that long. So the following day, when I finished my shift in the storeroom, I made my way to his office in Tawfiqiya Square. He was taken aback to see me but gave me a warm welcome. He looked at me as if he knew what was on my mind.

“What can I get you to drink?” he asked in a friendly manner.

“Nothing, thanks.”

He made a gesture to his office boy to fetch some tea. I did not object. I did not want to waste my anger on trifles.

“Was it difficult to find my office?” he said, smiling.

“No. Everyone knows this street.”

“I have been renting this office for the last ten years. It has the advantage of being large and quite comfortable. The other tenants in the building are decent, and it is downtown. Very easy to find.”

I made no comment.

“I would never be to able to find anything like it for such a low rent,” he carried on. “Guess how much I pay per month!”

“Abd el-Barr. Let us not ignore the reason for this visit.”

“What do you mean?”

“I think you know.”

“If you’re talking about the matter with Saleha,” he smiled, “let’s not talk here. I have a few things to do, but if you can wait half an hour, I’ll invite you to lunch, and we can speak more freely.”

Realizing he was trying to avoid a scene, I raised my voice, “We need to talk now.”

The office boy put a glass of tea down in front of me and went out. Abd el-Barr came over and sat in the armchair opposite me.

“And just what do you want, Kamel?” he asked in an aggressive whisper.

“I want you to divorce Saleha.”

“You do know that she ran away from our home?”

“She ran away because you were beating her.”

“I hit her because she was behaving outrageously.”

“If anyone raises a hand against my sister, he has me to answer to.”

His eyes almost popped out of his head. He looked like he was about to say something but just sat there looking at the ground, and then he lit a cigarette, and I noticed his hand shaking.

“Listen, Abd el-Barr,” I said quietly. “Just as we entered into all of this in a decent way, let’s end it decently.”

“It was your brother who arranged this, not you.”

“It’s Saleha who is asking for a divorce.”

“So in your family, it’s women, not men, who make the decisions?”

“We all speak up for ourselves.”

“And what if I don’t want a divorce?”

“You’d be happy living with a woman who doesn’t want to be with you?”

“If we were to listen to every hysterical woman, there’d be no families left in all of Egypt. Women don’t make good decisions. They’re fickle.”

“My sister, Saleha, is better educated than you.”

I said that just to provoke him. He was breathing heavily and trying to control himself.

“That’s enough, Kamel,” he said quietly. “Let’s not talk any more now. Wait until you have calmed down.”

I got up and walked over to him.

“You have to divorce Saleha immediately,” I shouted.

“Lower your voice.”

“I’ll speak however I like.”

“Seems you lack manners, just like your sister.”

“If anyone needs to learn manners, it’s you.”

He jumped to his feet, let out a shout and threw a punch, but I ducked it, grabbing his arm and twisting it behind his back, and yelled, “I’ll rip off the arm you used to hit my sister!”

At this point, the office staff rushed in to separate us.

“I’ll ruin your name!” I bellowed. “You low-down drug addict!”

He responded with a stream of invective, but he seemed shaken.

Seeing my accusations had hit a nerve, I started shouting at him again, “You should have got over your drug habit before marrying a woman from a decent family!”

The staff started trying to counter my accusation, but their protests were not terribly convincing. It seemed they knew the truth. As they hustled me out of the office, they took their time, as if to give me a chance to carry on insulting him.

“I’ll give you one week,” I shouted. “If you don’t divorce Saleha, I’m going to report you to the police for using drugs.”

I stumbled out onto the street. I was overwrought, but at the same time I felt happy about having shown up Abd el-Barr in front of his employees. I had managed to get back at him for humiliating my sister. I reached Soliman Pasha Street and walked down the Estoril passage to get to the Automobile Club. I started my shift in the storeroom with my mind completely distracted. Comanus noticed, but when he asked me what the matter was, I told him I was exhausted from my studies.

I finished my shift in the evening, and when I arrived home, I saw Saleha. The bruises on her face had turned blue. She put her arms around me and clung to me as she used to do when she was a child.

“Come to my bedroom,” I told her. “I have a few things to tell you.”

“Stay here and talk,” my mother said, getting up. “I’ll be in the kitchen.”

I sat next to Saleha.

“I want you to look on all of this,” I told her, “as just a bad experience that you’ll forget.”

“What if Abd el-Barr won’t divorce me?”

“He’ll divorce you, whether he wants to or not.”

“Have you seen him?”

I nodded, and she asked me anxiously, “What did he say to you?”

“Don’t worry yourself about it. We got you into this mess, and we’ll get you out of it. As far as I’m concerned, the most important thing is for you to go back to school.”

“I can’t. I can’t face my school friends now that I have failed in my marriage.”